Absolution
by rmonroe
Summary: When a malarial infection causes Clint to lose part of who he is, Natasha battles her own inner demons and the rest of the team try desperately to hold everyone together. Clint/Natasha, Tony/Pepper; Post-Avengers AU
1. Prologue

Hello! This thing has been over two years in the making (which makes it an AU since canon has changed since I started this thing. Thanks a lot Captain America 2 :)) and I sincerely hope you enjoy.

* * *

"Clint. Open your eyes."

Natasha watched her partner struggle to blink, like his eyelids were under a great weight. She held her breath in the still air, waiting for a coherent response, something that would give her hope that she wouldn't have to carry him out of the dense forest.

He stared at her for a moment, his eyes half-open. "Clint, we have to keep moving," she said, holding his uninjured arm. "You have to help me. I can't -" She took a steadying breath and wiped sweat out of her eyes with the back of her wrist as a wave of nausea hit her.

He rolled a little to the side, shifting his broken arm gasping in surprise when the pain hit. She held his shoulder tighter. "Don't - here." She grabbed his undamaged arm and tried to get it positioned across her shoulders but he made no effort to sit up and she had to sit back, shaking from the effort of trying to pull him up on her own.

She stared at Clint, calculating the risks of staying there for just a few more minutes, letting him rest. Letting herself rest.

"France's lighting up ..." he mumbled suddenly.

For a moment she was happy to hear him speak before she realized that it hadn't made any sense. She leaned over him, putting her hand against his face, frowning at the heat still coming off of his skin. "What are you talking about?" she asked.

He rolled his head toward her, leaning into her hand. "You never know."

"I don't know what you're saying," she said, frustration and fear swelling up inside her.

His eyes flickered open and cleared and for a moment she thought she had him back. "You're ... beautiful."

"Not helpful," she muttered, her heart sinking. "Do you know where we are?"

He nodded, his eyes sliding closed again.

"Tell me," she demanded.

He just nodded.

She sat back, the heat of the jungle pushing her down. She wanted to curl up next to him and sleep until this was over, but if they stayed in one place she knew it wouldn't be long before they were found. They'd already been here too long.

She grabbed Clint's arm again, pulling it across her shoulders and tugging at him. "You have to help me," she told him. "We have to keep moving."

She got her feet under her and tried to stand with a grunt, but he was too heavy for her to dead lift. "Please, Clint!" she gasped, one hand holding his wrist and the other one around his waist.

He bent his good leg and pushed against it, trying to stand. It was enough to get them both up, but her hand pressed against his broken ribs as she tried to keep her balance and he cried out, his leg buckling. She grit her teeth and fought to keep them both upright, not knowing if she could get him up again if he went down.

"You can do it," she said, doubting they could even manage a few steps. "It's just a little farther." She shuffled forward, taking most of his weight as he tried to limp along with her. "Stay with me. You're -"

She went still, her ears straining to identify a sudden sound. She desperately hoped it was just an animal moving through the dense underbrush. Then she heard a faint shout. Their captors were coming for them already. She cursed under her breath, looking around for some kind of inspiration.

But she already knew what she would do. She was going to have to leave Clint behind.


	2. Chapter 1

Thanks for reading, favoriting, following and reviewing! Some fluff before we get to the drama. :) Also, someone recommended my Little Leverage fic to somebody else on Tumblr and I was really flattered and delighted. So if that's you, THANK YOU! It made my day!

* * *

_2 weeks earlier_

"To Stark Industries," Clint said with a smirk, raising his glass. "For providing the view. And the wine, technically."

Natasha raised her eyebrows. "I'm not toasting Stark."

His eyes didn't leave her face as he swirled his wine thoughtfully. "How about Pepper?"

Natasha allowed herself a smile. Pepper had become the closest thing she could call a friend in the years since The Battle of New York. It was partially because there was a sense of solidarity in being the only females at The Tower and partially because it was nearly impossible _not _to be friends with Pepper.

Natasha clinked her glass against Clint's. "To Pepper."

They sipped the wine and she looked out across New York. The roof of The Tower _did_ provide an excellent view, and the beginnings of an incredible sunset was settling in over the city. Someone else would have called it romantic.

Clint set his glass down on the blanket and stretched out on his back, hands behind his head, his eyes closed. Natasha turned from the sunset to watch him, realizing with a little pull behind her breastbone how much she'd missed him.

They'd both been spread out across the globe for months running S.H.I.E.L.D.'s errands and training other agents, and normally Natasha liked being busy, she didn't know anything else, but she missed the days when they got to be busy doing the same things. When Clint had first recruited her for S.H.I.E.L.D. they were almost always sent on missions together because they didn't trust her. But it hadn't taken long for her to prove her loyalty and her usefulness. Now, S.H.I.E.L.D. liked to spread out their resources. Before they had both gotten home the night before, she hadn't seen Clint for over a month.

"We haven't even had dessert and you're falling asleep on me," she said, letting her smile color her tone.

He smiled, his eyes still closed. "Jet lag."

"If you don't have a permanent time zone you don't get to use jet lag as an excuse," she said, moving the wine bottle and their glasses to the side so she could sit by him. She brought her knees up to her chest and rested her chin on them, grateful to be wearing denim and not leather. She felt Clint's fingers graze her back.

"I miss you," he said softly.

Her own eyes slid closed, his fingers draining some of the tension from her body. "It's been too long since we've been on a mission together."

He snorted. "I don't even remember the last one. I think Fury's onto us."

She heard the ruefulness in his voice and smiled, looking back at him. "He's been onto us for years."

"You think so?" He sat up a little, supporting himself on his elbows. "You think it was that time he caught us making out in the supply closet?"

"We've never made out in a supply closet."

He grinned at her. "Want to?"

She smiled and leaned into him, but they both heard the roof access door open and jerked away from each other. Fury, and everyone else they knew for that matter, might know about their more-than-platonic relationship, but that didn't mean they didn't at least try to be discrete.

Natasha didn't see anyone at the door for a moment, but then a small, reddish-haired head poked out.

Clint groaned, sitting up. "How does he _do_ that?"

Natasha put a consoling hand on his knee. "Keep in mind who his parents are." She smiled at the little boy and he returned the grin, opening the door further and running over to them.

Natasha deftly moved the wine glasses and bottle before Felix, the three-year-old son of Tony and Pepper, could bowl them over in his toddler-ish exuberance. He plopped himself on Clint's lap and started inspecting the archer's pockets for his phone.

"Hello to you too," Clint grumbled, removing his phone from his pocket and handing it to the little boy.

"Hi!" Felix chirped, not picking up on Clint's sarcasm.

Natasha watched them as Clint put in his password so Felix could play one of his games. "And you wonder why he always seems to find you."

Clint looked up at her. "He has a whole freaking tower full of tech and he wants to play with my phone?"

She smirked. "Well, he's a Stark."

"Irritating on purpose," he said, lifting the little boy off his lap and onto the blanket. "And disturbingly good at hacking security systems."

Jarvis was definitely not supposed to allow the toddler on the roof, but Felix had found a way of getting around most of Tony's security protocols. Clint said it was because the A.I. had a soft spot for "young sir" and Natasha always argued that a computer couldn't have a soft spot. Then again, assassins weren't supposed to have soft spots either.

Felix, denied Clint's lap, came over to hers, leaning back against her and lifting Clint's phone, presumably to show her the game.

"See Nattie?" he said, his small fingers moving deftly across the screen.

"He's gonna beat your high score," she warned Clint.

He made a half-hearted grab for the phone and Felix whined, holding it out of his reach. "C'mon kid, go bug your parents or The Hulk or someone," Clint said, looking at her with pleading in his eyes. He was protective of his high scores.

"Felix," Natasha said gently. "You're not supposed to be up here."

He glanced up, and she knew he was watching her to see if he was in trouble. "I 'tay with you," he said sweetly, making his big brown eyes even bigger.

Clint laughed, incredulous. "He's actually trying to play you, Nat. Little -"

"Careful what you say around him," she said, cutting him off. "He can repeat things now." Natasha shifted so she was sitting cross-legged so the little boy could sit more comfortably in her lap.

"Can we get rid of him?" Clint said, looking at her pointedly.

"I'm sure someone will come get him in a minute," she said, putting an arm around Felix. She liked being around the little boy now that was potty-trained and interactive. He reminded her of the few things that were alright with the world, even if he shared genetic material with Tony Stark.

Clint was surprisingly quiet, and she looked up to find him watching her with an odd look on his face. "You like him."

She shrugged. "You like him sometimes, too."

"Yeah, when he's hacking Stark's stuff or sleeping."

She thought for a moment. "I like how he's heavy and not heavy at the same time. You can pick him up and carry him around but he's still real and solid."

He didn't laugh like she thought he would. He just sat there, watching her. "Sometimes I wish things had been different for you," he said.

She was suddenly uncomfortable with his seriousness. "I don't. We wouldn't be here now if things were different."

He shook his head. "I just mean … life hasn't always been fair to you. You deserve better."

She stared at him, fighting off the urge to laugh. "Life isn't fair for anyone."

"You know what I mean. I just wish we could be here without some of the crap that brought us here, you know?"

She sort of knew what he meant, but it was still far too fanciful a notion for her to indulge. "Wishing doesn't make any difference. If something happened, it happened. It doesn't go away."

"I know that. We all know that, Nat," he said, and she could hear his frustration.

She looked up at him, seeing in his eyes the things he'd told her about his own past. They both had demons. "What would be different?" she asked, humoring him.

The corner of his mouth lifted and he laid back down on the blanket, lacing his fingers behind his head. "What would you want to be different?"

"If I had never become who I am, I wouldn't have met you," she said.

He ignored that comment. "C'mon. If you could have any kind of life, what one would you want?"

"What other kind of life is there for someone like me?" she said. She made her voice light but the words felt heavy.

Clint didn't answer, and Felix lifted the phone toward Natasha's face again. "I did it!" he exclaimed.

"Good job," she told him, deciding not to tell Clint that the little boy had just beat his high score by three hundred points.

"You could've been a dancer," Clint said. "And then when you got tired of that you could've settled down in a nice house with a white picket fence and a dog and had a little redheaded kid or two."

She stared at him.

He sat up a little and she could tell he wasn't kidding. "C'mon, Nat. You've never thought about how your life would be if you were a normal person?"

"No, I haven't," she lied, a little annoyed that he was forcing an imaginary American dream on her. "What makes you think I want any of those things?"

"'Cause that's what I would want," he said, looking out at the skyline and letting the words tumble out. "A two-story house in a nice suburb with some kids and a dog, and probably a tire swing or a hammock."

She watched his profile, surprised. He'd never mentioned wanting anything like that before. She couldn't understand why they were having this conversation. "I would want an apple tree," she said. "And the house would be blue, with a white wrap-around porch. Maybe a kid, no dog. And I would own my own dance studio."

He looked at her and smiled, but his eyes were sad. "I knew it. You've thought about it."

She rolled her eyes. "That kind of life is so far removed that it doesn't matter. Normal doesn't exist for us."

They heard the roof access door open again and they looked over, Natasha fully expecting to see Pepper. But it was Phil.

Felix saw him and jumped up, dropping Clint's phone. "Unca Phil!" he exclaimed, running over.

Phil lifted the little boy to his hip and returned Felix's hug. "How are you, Felix?" he asked, using the same polite tone he used with everyone.

Natasha and Clint stood, already fearing the apologetic smile Phil was wearing.

Clint folded his arms. "You promised a few days."

"You'll have to take that up with the bio weapons dealers in the Budongo forest. I'm sorry," Phil said. "But I need you both in Uganda by tomorrow."

Natasha shared a glance with Clint. At least they would be on the mission together.

"Your flight leaves at 2200 hours tonight. I'll be briefing you on the way on what little we know."

"You know," Clint said. "Someday you're going to have to start depending on other agents."

"Not while I have the best," Phil replied, smiling slightly. "I'll take Felix downstairs with me."

He headed for the stairwell and Natasha's heart sank. A few days rest would have been nice.

Phil looked back at them. "I'm sorry," he said again, and disappeared through the door.

"Well," Clint said wearily. "I guess we're off to save the world again."


	3. Chapter 2

Thanks for reading! I'm going to try and get these chapters up a little faster so it will be done before Ultron comes out. :)

* * *

Natasha moved through the forest soundlessly, picking her way through the long ferns and tangled roots with her usual grace. She kept her eyes moving, watchful for anything out of the ordinary, but she couldn't see much through the dense jungle. Clint walked a few yards to her right, though he was making less of an effort to be quiet. She glanced at him, not surprised to see the scowl on his face. She knew jungles weren't his favorite type of terrain in the first place and after three days stumbling through the underbrush in the humidity he was less than thrilled. Clint slowed to a stop and she paused, glancing over at him as he checked his GPS. She heard him curse under his breath and ran lightly over to him.

"We're too far north again," he told her, holding out his arm so she could read the tiny screen strapped to his wrist.

"Maybe. Coulson said it could be anywhere within two clicks of those coordinates," she said, mentally reconstructing the map Phil had shown them on the flight over.

"It's nice that he only sends us on easy missions," Clint said, shaking his head. "If we head south southwest maybe we'll get lucky and walk right into the compound."

If we can stay heading that way, she thought as they started moving through the jungle again, adjusting their course. There were no landmarks and the light of the sun was diffused through layers of foliage so it was difficult to tell which direction it was coming from. It was nearly impossible to tell which way they were going, and it made it worse that they barely knew what they were looking for besides a "group of Russian scientists somewhere in the Budongo forest."

Phil had told them that three years ago, a group of Russian biochemists calling themselves The Listovki had entrenched themselves in the Budongo forest to study a common anti-malarial herb known as "Nimbima." There was speculation that extracts from the plant could be used to treat everything from diabetes to cancer, and the group was originally hailed as heroes for their dedication to finding cures. But nothing had been heard from them in the past six months.

S.H.I.E.L.D. hadn't been concerned about it until a week ago when Ugandan Muslim extremists had shown up in Kampala with a bioweapon. They were apprehended before aerosolizing the weapon and when officials analyzed it they determined it contained a new strain of Malaria that wasn't blood-borne, but could be transmitted by inhalation instead. When S.H.I.E.L.D. scientists got their hands on it, they realized through a lucky hunch that the new strain's creation involved the DNA from the Nimbima plant. It hadn't taken them long to assume a connection between the bioweapon and The Listovki.

But no one knew where The Listovki were exactly, or even if they still existed. And Phil had explained that more and more bioweapons had been showing up containing the new, more deadly, strain of Malaria. All S.H.I.E.L.D. wanted them to do, he'd explained carefully, is gather intel on The Listovki. "We don't want anybody dead until we know what's going on," he'd told them leaning forward in the helicopter. "If you haven't found their research compound in two weeks, we're pulling you out."

Clint had scoffed, asking why they were sending two assassins into a forest for reconnaissance, and she had wondered the same thing. Phil had looked him in the eyes and reminded him that they were dealing with terrorists and biochemists and a myriad of unknowns. And then he'd promised Clint that if he really wanted to, he could lead the assault team that would go in if The Listovki were really helping to produce bioweapons. Then he'd informed them that no contact with headquarters was to be made until the rendezvous. "We can't be implicated in this," he'd insisted. "The area is unstable enough as it is."

"We better find this place soon," Clint said, loud enough for her to hear him but soft enough to be muffled by the surrounding foliage.

"We will," she said, sounding more confident than she felt. "We've only been out here for three days."

"You think it's really this group of Russian scientists supplying the bioweapons?"

"Everything seems to point to them," she said, frowning in thought.

"But S.H.I.E.L.D. specializes in complicating things," he said.

They were beginning to head down a steeper decline, and Natasha knew that meant they were getting closer to the west bank of Lake Albert. As the terrain became rockier, the plant growth thinned a little and she could see farther ahead. She paused before moving down the hill and walked a few steps back and forth, trying to find the best angle through the trees to see out across the valley.

"Clint," she said, and he paused. "Do you see something over there?" He came to stand next to her and she pointed to the neighboring hillside. "Maybe a road, or track?"

"Worth a shot," he said after a moment. "It's possible they're running supplies from Nyamegita through here. If that's the road they're using, it'll lead us right to them."

With a little thrill of adrenaline, Natasha followed him further down the hill. She wouldn't allow herself to hope that they'd found the compound so soon, but trekking through the jungle felt more purposeful, even though the glimpse of white she'd seen was still miles away.

"It'll be dark by the time we reach it," Clint said, glancing up at what little could be seen of the sky.

Natasha had assumed as much. "We can camp on the valley floor. We won't get any moonlight and it's too risky to move through this in the dark," she said, sweeping a mess of creepers out of her way.

"I hope you remembered the s'mores this time," he replied dryly.

She smiled at the back of his head. She was one of the few people who fully appreciated his sarcastic sense of humor. Mostly she just appreciated that he could come through everything he'd come through with a sense of humor at all.

As the scattered daylight turned into an ambient orange glow, they found a space clear enough to pitch their tent. Natasha sank down gratefully on the spongy ground and opened a protein bar. Clint sat next to her, their shoulders touching.

"I'll take first watch," he offered.

"Are you sure? You did last night," she said.

He shrugged. "I won't be able to fall asleep anyway."

She nodded sympathetically. She doubted she'd be getting much sleep either. She wanted to keep moving up the hill; the sooner they found the compound the sooner they could get out of the jungle. "When we get out of here we should go somewhere," she said, leaning into him slightly.

"You mean somewhere S.H.I.E.L.D. can't find us?"

She nodded. "There has to be somewhere."

He leaned over and kissed her temple in a sudden and uncharacteristic display of affection. "Get some sleep, Nat. I'll wake you in a few hours."

* * *

Heavy clouds rolled in with the dawn and while the wide tropical leaves overhead kept off most of the rain, the forest was dim and almost insufferably humid. They were both quiet as they began their trek up the hillside, putting all of their focus into finding the barely visible trail they'd seen.

It was late afternoon when they found the compound. They had come up slowly and silently from the bottom of the hill, following the track but staying off it until they were just a quarter mile above the large white square of a wall that housed several buildings and huts. The compound was nestled into the steep, rocky hillside almost directly below them and looked like they had expected an established research camp to look, except for the armed guards pacing along the length of the wall.

"Do you know any research teams that keep guards lining their compounds?" Clint muttered rhetorically, peering through his binoculars.

"There are at least 80 people here," Natasha said, switching on the infared sensors in her own binoculars. "And most of them don't look like scientists."

Clint let his hand fall, the binoculars dangling from it, and looked at her. "How about Tristan Da Cunha?"

She looked at him, trying to puzzle out what he was talking about.

He grinned and stepped closer to her. "It's an island. Right in the middle of the ocean between South Africa and South America."

She smiled back, suddenly understanding. "The most remote place in the world."

He took another step toward her and reached for her hand. "We'll call this in right now and let S.H.I.E.L.D clean this up by themselves. We could get out of here, maybe even-"

He stopped suddenly and an odd look came over his face.

"Clint?" she said, worry creeping through her stomach. His hand tightened convulsively around her's and then his eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed.

Before she could even check him for injuries she felt a pinprick in her neck and a sudden numbness spread down her vertebrae.

She had just enough time to register that Clint hadn't had time to alert S.H.I.E.L.D. to their location before the darkness at the edge of her vision closed in.


	4. Chapter 3

Clint's arm was on fire. The pain started at the crease of his elbow and crawled up through his veins. His eyes snapped open and he looked down, his heart suddenly pounding. An IV was imbedded in his left arm and he felt panic start to creep up through his stomach. Suddenly nauseous, he jerked his right hand toward the needle but realized he was tied down. Taking a deep breath he ignored the IV for the moment and took in his surroundings.

He was laying on a cot, his hands tied to the aluminum poles that made up the frame. The room he was in was made entirely of cement and bare except for an outdated vitals monitor he was hooked up to. The door looked like little more than plywood and the single window was open, admitting the chirping sounds of the jungle's insects and birds, and the crushing humidity.

His eyes followed the IV line up to the bag suspended above his head. He noticed with trepidation that the bag was nearly empty of a thick, yellowish liquid, and it was blank of anything that could tell him what was being pumped into his body. If the burning feeling seeping through his arm and spreading across his chest was any indication, it wasn't anything good.

He jerked against the ropes around his wrists again but he could tell his limbs were weakened, either by whatever was being administered now or whatever they had used to knock him out with. As the full memory of being tranquilized came back to him, his lingering panic returned in full force. What had they done with Natasha?

He tried to twist his wrists out of the ropes but only succeeded in rubbing his own skin off. He looked around again, hopeful for a moment that there would be something sharp within reach. They had left him his clothes, but his boots, tac vest, and anything in his pockets had been taken, and he wouldn't have been able to reach anything anyway.

He heard footsteps outside the room and watched the door warily as it opened, briefly considering feigning unconsciousness, but not wanting to close his eyes until he knew more about where he was. Three men came in, the first two obvious militia of some kind. Clint didn't recognize their uniforms but he couldn't mistake their tactical rifles.

The third man was dressed in slacks and a sweat-stained polo. He regarded Clint coolly from behind wire-rimmed glasses before walking over and checking the IV bag. The two others remained by the doorway, their hands on their weapons.

"Dr. Livingston, I presume," Clint said dryly when none of them spoke.

The man glanced at him and then, to Clint's relief and apprehension, ripped the tape off his arm and slid the needle out.

He glanced at Clint, studying him for a moment, and then turned to the vitals monitor.

"Hey, look," Clint tried again, fighting his urgent need to ask about Natasha. "I don't know who you are or where I am. We were out on recon, got lost, we were trying to get back to-"

"I know why you are here, American," the man answered suddenly, his Russian accent heavy.

"I'm here because somebody shot me with a tranquilizer. What was in that stuff anyway?" he said, trying not to sound concerned.

"You are here because of the weapons," the man said, taking a penlight from his breast pocket and pulling Clint's eyelid back.

Clint squinted against the sudden brightness. "I don't know what you're talking about," he insisted.

"You do," the man said, switching the light to Clint's other eye. "It does not matter what you know." He switched to Russian. "You will be dead before leaving here."

Clint raised his eyebrows as the man stepped away with the penlight. "You've been watching too many crappy movies."

The man gave a short bark of a laugh. "You won't act so smart when you're dying." His eyes flicked over to the empty IV bag. "I think you will not live more than two weeks. But that was a new batch. An experiment. So maybe shorter."

Clint swallowed, carefully controlling his breathing even as the vitals monitor revealed how fast his heart was pounding. "Since I'm going to die, how about you satisfy my curiosity for me. How does a group of humanitarian scientists get involved with bio-terrorism? What'd they offer you? Money? Fame? They kidnap your babies or something?"

The man's eyes flashed. "You are a fool."

"A dead one. So when did you decide to start killing people instead of saving them?" Clint pushed, doing his best to make the guy mad. If he could get him to come just a little closer, he could grab the pen out of his pants pocket.

"You understand _nothing,_" the man spat, stepping closer and stabbing a finger into Clint's chest. "The Listovki came here for science, not people."

Clint laughed. "So finding a life-saving cure for Malaria had nothing to do with your research? You just wanted to play with your lab toys in the jungle? Maybe make a few bucks when your new drug starts selling big? I didn't really have you guys pegged as shallow little money grubbers, but-"

The man lurched forward, grabbing Clint's jaw painfully. "Keep your mouth shut and I may decide to ease your passing when the pain becomes unbearable," he growled, slipping into Russian again.

Clint regarded him until the man released his face and stepped back. Clint carefully hid the pen under his palm. "Sorry," he said in perfect Russian. "My Russian isn't so good. Could you repeat that?"

The man raised his hand and Clint steeled himself for a blow but the door suddenly opened and another man in military uniform spoke rapidly. Clint's Bantu wasn't as good as his Russian, but he caught the words "hurry" and "prisoner." Hope and dread swelled up in equal measure through his chest. He was guessing either Natasha was escaping or dying.

He waited the few short, tortuous seconds for the men to leave him alone in the room again before he began using the pen to pry at the knots holding down his right wrist. His fingers were numb from the tight bonds and the rope rubbed painfully against his already raw wrist. He listened for anything that might tell him where Natasha was but he couldn't hear much besides the occasional pounding of feet when someone ran past the door, and shouts from outside the window.

After a while things quieted down outside, and no one came back into his room. The first knot finally came loose and it gave him enough room to bend his arm more and get more leverage. Before long, his right hand was free and he shook it out, wincing at the sudden prickling feeling in his previously numb fingers. Now that he could sit up he tried to see out the window but could only see the wall of another building and the treetops above it. Then he went to work on the knots holding down his left hand.

He was working his last leg loose when the door opened. Seeing his hands free, the soldier in the doorway raised his rifle and shouted something into the hallway behind him. Clint raised his hands and tried to look harmless as the man stabbed his gun at him. Another two men followed the first into the room. The first man came forward and let his gun drop just a little as he leaned forward to pick up one of the ropes from the bed. It was enough for Clint.

He knocked the tip of the rifle away from his chest with one hand and grabbed the man's vest with his other hand, yanking him closer. The man gave a surprised yell and Clint tried to turn him and get his arm around the man's throat but he was a little slower and weaker than normal and didn't get him in a headlock. The man shoved him away, even as the other men came running to help. Clint reached for the man's rifle again but couldn't get a hold on it and one of the other men cracked him across the face with the butt of his rifle. Clint toppled backwards off the cot. His leg was still tied to it but he managed to turn so that his hands would hit the ground first despite the weakness in his limbs. The weight of his body tore his ankle free of the rope but he felt something in his knee wrench.

The men shouted in Bantu, but Clint's brain was reacting too slowly to even begin to translate. He got to his feet as they came around the cot. He realized they seemed to be hesitant to shoot him for some reason, and emboldened, he charged forward and grabbed the tip of the nearest rifle and shoved it into its owner's stomach. Surprised, the man stumbled backward and Clint used the moment to send his fist crashing into the man's face and shove past him, aiming the pen still in his hand at the next guy's throat.

The man gave a gurgling scream and fell to the ground, clutching at his neck. His companion gave a pained cry and reached for the fallen man, leaving the way clear for Clint to get out the door.

He moved as fast as he could but the pain was almost unbearable when he tried to put weight on his left knee. His hand was on the doorframe when something heavy crashed into his left leg. He heard something crack and his leg buckled. He rolled to face his attacker just in time for the soldier who had been so distraught about the pen in his companion's neck to bring the metal chair that had just broken his leg into Clint's ribs.

Clint scrambled across the cement floor, trying to get his lungs to inflate past the agony in his side. He reached, trying to grab the rifle of the man he'd stabbed with the pen, but his attacker swung the chair again, this time at Clint's head. He rolled just in time and raised his arm to fend off the blow and the chair came crashing into his forearm.

The man raised the chair again, fury in his eyes, but Clint was so overwhelmed with pain that he couldn't do anything more than make an attempt to roll out of the way.

"Stop!" came a sudden angry shout. Clint recognized the Russian accent and turned his head to see "Dr. Livingston" coming into the room. He spat something in Bantu but the man continued to hold the chair over Clint, gesturing angrily at the dead man with Clint's pen in his throat and the other man holding his broken nose.

The doctor stepped closer, his face red and his eyes flashing. But Clint was fading fast. He felt disconnected and it was as if every part of him was moving in slow motion. The pain was so bad that he was using his last remaining scraps of energy to keep from vomiting. Black crowded the edges of his vision and the angry voices he heard over him were suddenly muffled. His breaths were coming in short, panicked gasps; he was unable to draw an entire lungful of air.

And as the man with the chair finally stepped away, Clint succumbed to blackness.

* * *

I hope you enjoyed! Let me know what you think? :)


	5. Chapter 4

For a moment, Clint thought he was in Afghanistan. There was heat, and pain, and the smell of sweat, and even the cement walls surrounding him looked like a bunker. But through the heat and haze things slowly began to come back to him in little flashes. Natasha in the forest, something dripping into his arm, the doctor's pen in a man's throat. He remembered not knowing if his partner had made it out or not.

He struggled to a sitting position, holding his broken ribs with his good arm in an effort to keep them from shifting and puncturing his lung, and took stock of his cell. The tiny cement room had no window, and a much heavier door than the one in his previous room had been. There was nothing in it except a bucket for obvious purposes. At least he wasn't tied to anything this time.

_Not that it matters,_ he thought, taking stock of his injuries. He wasn't going to get far with a torn ACL and a cracked fibula in his left leg and a broken arm. Not to mention his ribs. At least three were broken. And then there was the matter of whatever they'd pumped into him. He was guessing it was something akin to malaria, but so far all it seemed to do was make him feel weak. He was hoping the round of malaria inoculations he and Natasha had both received before the mission would be enough to stave the worst of it off.

He knew he wouldn't get very far, but that wasn't going to stop him from trying. If Natasha hadn't made it out, it was up to him to save them both. He had no way to contact SHIELD and he guessed it had been less than twenty-four hours since their capture which meant they wouldn't be expected at the extraction point for another eight days.

There were voices outside the door. Clint braced himself and scooted closer, biting his lip to stay silent when pain flooded his body at the movement. He could just hear them well enough to determine they were speaking Bantu, but his head was swimming from pain and exhaustion and he was having trouble understanding. He focused, his ear pressed against the heavy wooden door, trying to gain some information that might help him escape.

The more he listened, the more Bantu he'd picked up over the years came back to him, and he realized they were talking about Natasha. Unless there was another recently escaped prisoner. They were complaining about the lack of alcohol at the base due to their latest supply truck being hijacked, and Clint smiled, relieved. Natasha was alive and healthy enough to single-handedly hijack a supply truck.

The men outside, Clint was guessing they were his guards, continued, one of them telling the other that the next supply truck wouldn't be for another week and the prisoner would probably be caught by then. They changed topics and Clint continued to listen, but his head felt unnaturally foggy and the heat wasn't helping anything.

He found himself wondering again what they'd injected him with, before his thoughts started to scatter. For a moment he was back on top of Stark Tower with Natasha, but when Phil came through the door it was suddenly Loki. Clint shook his head, knowing that wasn't right, and the images scattered before him, leaving him back in the cement cell.

He dragged his good hand across his eyes, trying to focus. But black was starting at the edges of his vision and he didn't have the strength to fight it. He leaned his aching head against the wall and let it claim him.

The next time he woke up, the door was opening. He was still slumped against it and he attempted to move but his ribs were screaming at him and the heat was sapping his strength. Luckily, the door only opened a crack, shifting him slightly, and someone slid in a paper cup filled with water before closing it again. Suddenly, Clint was desperately thirsty and he reached for the water with his good arm, his fingers barely grazing the rim. He leaned over, ignoring the fiery pain across his entire body and dragged the cup to himself, lifting it to his lips in such a hurry that some sloshed out. He drank it in two gulps, but the lukewarm water did little to quench the heat that was consuming him.

_Fever_, he realized dully. _A fever means infection._ That wasn't good. He tried to remember how long he'd been in the compound, but he couldn't judge time in a windowless cell when he was dropping in and out of consciousness.

"If it isn't my favorite agent," a voice suddenly said.

Clint looked around frantically. He knew that voice.

"How did you manage _this _one, Barton?" Loki said, laughter in his voice. "You're not getting out of here, are you? Not unless that little friend of yours can manage some sort of rescue. But isn't it more likely she'll be killed trying to get you out? You can barely stand."

"Shut up," Clint growled, wondering how Loki was speaking to him without even being there.

"Of course, if you do get out of here, that beloved Coulson of yours will have some questions."

"I said shut up!" Clint shouted, struggling to sit up.

"You compromised her," the voice sneered. "She never would've let her guard down if you hadn't been talking about that island. Running away together? Really? You must work on your creativity. Did I teach you nothing?"

Clint grabbed blocked one of his ears with his good hand, pressing the other one against the rough cement. "Get out!"

His tormentor just laughed. And kept laughing. Clint pressed harder against the wall, screaming for it to stop.

But suddenly the laugh became gunshots and he ducked reflexively though there were no flashes of light and he was still inside the cell. It sounded like bullets were flying right past his head and he ducked, covering his head and huddling against the wall.

_Gunshots, screaming, laughter, music, voices. _They wouldn't stop. He screamed at them, trying to drown them out with his own voice until he was hoarse.

"Clint!"

Another voice, another horror.

Hands pushed at him, tried to get him to uncover his head, tried to kill him.

"Clint!"

The pain in his arm suddenly tripled and he gasped, jerking toward the source. Hands grabbed his shoulders, shaking him, making him look.

"It's me," the voice hissed.

Natasha. It was Natasha. He stared at her, not sure if he could trust his senses. "What …"

"We have to get out of here," she said, eyes heavy with concern.

"No!" he shook his head vehemently. "You'll get killed. We'll get killed."

"Clint, focus!" she insisted. "I can get us out."

And suddenly he remembered that he trusted her. He didn't trust that noise in his head. He trusted Natasha. He nodded.

She stabbed a needle into his leg and pushed the plunger down and he felt his body hum with tension, the pain dulling and his mind clearing. "Get in the wheelchair."

They were moving then, past people and sounds and smells that he couldn't be sure were real. They were outside, the sun excruciatingly bright. There were shouts and he felt Natasha breaking into a run, the chair bouncing wildly over uneven ground and he grabbed the armrests. A sudden, deafening sound overcame the shouts, and Clint recognized it as an explosion somewhere behind them. Then there was a wall in front of them, and the wide doors at the entrance, guards struggling to pull it closed. They were charging straight for it, Natasha firing a gun behind his head, and then she was dragging him out of the chair, his good arm around her shoulders as he tried to stay on his feet despite the sudden fiery pain in his leg and ribs.

They were out. Not far out, and they still had miles of jungle to traverse before getting to their extraction point he knew, but the freedom was enough to keep him moving, stumbling and tripping as Natasha hurried them on through the trees.

* * *

Thank you my dear readers! Especially Niom Lamboise who has reviewed every chapter. I love it!


	6. Chapter 5

Thank you for the reviews, my friends! We're back where we started now. I hope you're still enjoying this! I know I am. :)

* * *

Clint collapsed against the wide trunk of a bugoma tree, sweating and gasping for breath. They'd had to cover a lot of ground before finding the secluded thicket Natasha had apparently already discovered, and every part of him hurt. The adrenaline she'd given him had long since worn off and he could feel every bruise and break, and the fever was making it difficult to stay focused again.

"You going to be okay?" she asked, crouching in front of him.

He nodded, too winded to speak.

She put a hand against his face, her eyes dark with worry. "What do you think your fever's at?"

He drew in as deep a breath as he could with broken ribs. "I can't tell. Over a hundred."

She nodded. "Mine was bad for a couple of days or I would've gotten you out sooner."

"They gave you the same stuff?" he said, concerned.

"I'm not sure, but I barely knew where I was for a while there," she admitted, her hand still against his face.

"Better now?" he asked, wondering why she had been able to shake it off so quickly.

"Mostly. Still some lightheadedness and muscle weakness, but it's getting better." She shifted so she was sitting next to him, stripping off the lab coat she'd been wearing to sneak into the compound and tearing it into strips. "Your turn. How bad?"

He hesitated, not looking forward to cataloguing his injuries and heightening her concern. But they'd both learned the hard way to be completely honest with one another regarding how much they were hurt. "Right arm's broken," he started, pointing with his good hand at his swollen fingertips. "Left ACL is torn or tearing. Fibula is probably at least cracked. Right floating ribs are broken."

"And the fever and weakness," she added, gently taking his broken arm in both her hands. "I think it's some form of malaria."

"We're vaccinated," he said, wincing as she probed his bruised skin.

"Not against whatever strain that was. Hold still." That was her only warning before she set the break with a quick jerk.

He bit back a scream, his body tensing in protest against the blinding pain. She splinted his arm with strips of bark and the fabric from the lab coat and he tried to relax against the tree and ignore the discomfort.

"I couldn't grab any meds," she said, putting his arm back in his lap and gesturing for him to sit up so she could get a look at his ribs. "The supply truck I raided earlier just had food, and I only had time to grab the adrenaline and coat before coming to get you."

He knew it was an apology and smiled at her as he struggled to sit up. "How long before SHIELD gets here?"

She pulled his shirt up and touched his side softly, feeling for the breaks. He sucked in a pained breath, doing his best to remain upright as she wrapped his abdomen just tight enough to keep the ribs in place and hopefully save him from a punctured lung.

"Thirteen hours," she answered his question after tying off the bandage and helping him lean back against the tree.

"How far?"

She moved down to his leg, rolling up his pants to examine his knee. "Twelve miles, back up the hill," she admitted. He could tell she was trying to hide her concern.

He wasn't too thrilled at the thought of trying to travel twelve miles through the forest injured, and with terrorists desperate not to let their secret get out on their tail.

"You should go," he said, knowing she was going to hate the idea. "You can move faster without me, bring back help."

She looked up from his leg and gave him one of her looks. "They'll find you."

"Maybe," he admitted. "But if I slow you down they'll kill us both."

She shook her head and her hands moved to his swollen calf.

"Natasha, don't … You can't …" Suddenly the forest was swimming around him, a strange buzzing in his ears.

"Clint?" She was there, cupping his face in her hands.

"I think … you should …" He felt like he was in a dream, unable to move at normal speed.

"Lay down for a minute. We should be safe for a while," she said, shifting to help him lay flat on the leaf-cushioned ground. "Are you going to throw up?"

He didn't think so, and managed to shake his head. He felt a shiver pass through him as he stared up at the darkening canopy overhead. He vaguely felt the pain in his knee as Natasha manipulated it to wrap it, but his senses were deserting him. With a long exhale, he gave in and closed his eyes.

* * *

Natasha let him rest for as long as she could, but she knew if they didn't make it to the checkpoint soon they would be found. And she wasn't sure how fast they were going to be able to move.

"Clint. Clint, open your eyes."

She watched him struggle to blink, his eyelids moving impossibly slow. She held her breath in the still air, waiting for a coherent response, something that would give her hope that she wouldn't have to carry him out of the dense forest.

He stared at her for a moment, his eyes half-open. "Clint, we have to keep moving," she said, holding his uninjured arm. "You have to help me. I can't -" She wiped sweat out of her eyes with the back of her wrist as a wave of nausea hit her, a leftover from the malarial cocktail still lingering.

He rolled a little to the side, shifting his broken arm. He gasped in surprise when the pain hit and she held his shoulder tighter. "Don't - here." She grabbed his undamaged arm and tried to get it positioned across her shoulders but he made no effort to sit up and she had to sit back, shaking from the effort of trying to pull him up on her own.

She stared at Clint, calculating the risks of staying there for just a few more minutes, letting him rest. Letting herself rest.

"France's lighting up ..." he mumbled suddenly.

For a moment she was happy to hear him speak before she realized that it hadn't made any sense. She leaned over him, putting her hand against his face, frowning at the heat still coming off of his skin. "What are you talking about?" she asked.

He rolled his head toward her, leaning into her hand. "You never know."

"I don't know what you're saying," she said, frustration and fear swelling up inside her.

His eyes flickered open and cleared and for a moment she thought she had him back. "You're ... beautiful."

"Not helpful," she muttered, her heart sinking. "Do you know where we are?"

He nodded, his eyes sliding closed again.

"Tell me," she demanded.

He just nodded again.

She sat back, the heat of the jungle pushing her down. She wanted to curl up next to him and sleep until this was over, but if they stayed in one place she knew it wouldn't be long before they were found. They'd already been here too long.

She grabbed Clint's arm again, pulling it across her shoulders and tugging at him. "You have to help me," she told him. "We have to keep moving."

She got her feet under her and tried to stand with a grunt, but he was too heavy for her to dead lift. "Please, Clint!" she gasped, one hand holding his wrist and the other one around his waist.

He bent his good leg and pushed against it, trying to stand. It was enough to get them both up, but her hand pressed against his broken ribs as she tried to keep her balance and he cried out, his leg buckling. She grit her teeth and fought to keep them both upright, not knowing if she could get him up again if he went down.

"You can do it," she said, doubting they could even manage a few steps. "It's just a little farther." She shuffled forward, taking most of his weight as he tried to limp along with her. "Stay with me. You're -"

She went still, her ears straining to identify a sudden sound. She desperately hoped it was just an animal moving through the dense underbrush. But it was getting louder. If it was an animal, it was several of them.

Then she heard a faint shout. Their captors were coming for them already. She cursed under her breath, looking around for some kind of inspiration.

But she already knew what she would do. She was going to have to leave Clint behind.


	7. Chapter 6

I'm sorry I didn't get this up sooner! I managed to get myself horribly sick over spring break. My goal is to get this all up before AoU comes out so I'm going to have to really step up my posting schedule! Anyway, thanks for sticking with me, and especially for your encouragement and reviews! :)

* * *

Natasha ran through the forest as quickly and as loudly as possible, trying to draw the men away from Clint's hiding place. Wet leaves slapped against her face and she had to focus on not tripping in the dying light of the evening, all while formulating some kind of plan on how to keep them away from Clint, split them up, and hopefully take a few of them out. She had no weapon; the gun she'd stolen to use in Clint's rescue was out of ammo. And while she knew she just had to keep the men off their trail long enough for her and Clint to get to the extraction point, there was a part of her that wanted to hurt them for what they'd done to her partner.

She heard them coming toward her, and she tried to count people by the sounds. She estimated there were at least nine or ten following her, and she could only hope that was all of them. She slowed down, letting them close the gap, and reached up for the nearest low-hanging branch, swinging herself into the tree.

She waited until the first of the men came running through, right under the tree, and leaped down, her feet pointed firmly at his back. He crashed to the ground and she wasted no time grabbing the firearm out of the holster at his hip, whipping around to fire at the next three men coming through the jungle toward her. Suddenly they were shouting and she heard more shots, but knew she'd downed at least three of them.

She ducked back behind the tree, moving silently now. It wasn't difficult, the pursuers were making more than enough noise to cover any sounds she made. They were gathering, just like she'd hoped, and she crept around behind them, listening as they discovered their fallen comrades. And then she attacked.

In the dark forest, with so much cover, she could easily dart in and out of the trees making their firearms nearly useless, and she did, striking them in all the deadliest ways she was known for. A crushed throat or two, some broken ribs, and ruptured kidneys, and the men weren't shouting anymore.

Natasha hurried back to Clint and was relieved to find him still there, but he was unconscious. She knelt next to him, tapping his cheek, trying to get him to wake up with no success.

But it was dark and she couldn't hear anyone else coming for them, so she sat next to him, her back against a tree and waited.

Dawn filtered through the leaves, burning off the moisture and slowly warming the exposed skin of Natasha's arms. Clint was already far too warm for her liking, and had spent the night shivering and sweating, and occasionally moaning. She'd used some of the dew-saturated leaves to drip water into his mouth, but it hadn't helped much.

They were running out of time. She hadn't heard anyone else coming for them, but they were still miles from the extraction point and she didn't think she could get Clint there without some help on his part.

She shook his shoulder carefully so she wouldn't hurt his arm or ribs too much, and smacked his cheek with her hand. "Clint," she said sharply.

To her surprise, his eyes came open. They were still clouded with confusion and pain, but he listened as she told him that they needed to go, and she got him to his feet, the night's rest apparently doing them both some good.

"I don't know where it is," he gasped, his good arm slung over her shoulders as they made their slow, painful way up the hill, one limping step at a time.

"What?" she asked, though she was fairly certain he didn't know himself.

"Jus' … lost it, I think," he said.

This time she didn't reply, just tried to move faster. They had a couple hours before S.H.I.E.L.D. would be there to pick them up, but they had another five or six miles to go, and they weren't moving very fast.

"Stop," he pleaded suddenly, stumbling again on his weakened leg. "It's … just please, stop."

She didn't. "We have to keep moving," she told him, trying to shift so she could take more of his weight across her aching shoulders.

He fell silent and they both saved their breath for the journey. They made it up the worst of the hill, and Natasha was beginning to hope they were going to make it with time to spare when Clint collapsed, both of his legs just giving out. She barely managed to stay upright herself, and tried to help lower him gently but he hit the ground with a solid thud.

"We're so _close,_" she muttered, kneeling next to him. His eyes were unfocused and his expression told her how much pain he was in. There was less than a mile to go, and she thought that maybe they had a moment to rest. Until she heard the voices. They weren't close yet, but they could move a lot faster than Natasha and Clint could. So much for that rest.

"They are _not_ going to catch us now," she said fiercely. "Not when we're almost out." She pulled Clint back up doing her best to ignore his pained gasps, and started forward again.

Their pursuers hadn't realized where they were yet, Natasha realized, they were just checking the area, but it probably wouldn't take them long. Especially if they spotted the S.H.I.E.L.D. helicopter that was supposed to be coming for them any second. _And_ they were running out of dense cover, the top of the hill largely rocky and less forested.

She paused in the last of the decent cover. "Clint," she said. "We'll stay here as long as we can, but when the chopper comes, we have to make a run for it. Just a little farther, okay?"

He didn't answer, his eyes squeezed shut against the pain.

The voices got closer, and there was no sign of their rescue yet. There were at least twenty men, and Natasha knew she had little hope of fighting them all off, so she was hoping they could remain hidden for a little longer.

The footsteps were almost on top of them now, and Natasha hunched low, trying to stay as small and hidden as possible, but any moment now the men would walk right past them. There wasn't enough cover to keep them out of sight. She wrapped her hand around the nearest stick and prepared to go out fighting.

But a sudden sound gave her pause. A familiar whine of engines and the thrum of thrusters. _Stark?_ The men coming through the jungle paused for a moment before the sudden sputtering of automatic weapons filled the jungle. She looked up, but couldn't see much through the trees.

"We're going," she told Clint, not waiting for an answer. She got him up, and he bit back a pained groan as they started walking again, heading for the checkpoint. Over the sound of gunfire, she heard the whine of helicopter blades and hurried Clint along. "Almost there," she told him over and over.

They were reaching the clearing now, and Natasha looked up again, just catching sight of Tony flying over the trees, drawing fire. "What is he doing here?" she muttered to herself.

The helicopter descended, the wind from the blades whipping Natasha's hair and stinging her eyes. She dragged Clint forward, his legs barely moving, hearing the gunfire far too close behind them. _Just get to the chopper,_ she told herself, focused on the open door.

To her surprise, Steve came leaping out of the chopper. "Get down!" he yelled, running toward them.

She recognized that tone of voice and dropped to the ground, Clint coming with her, but not before she felt a sudden blinding pain in her arm. She knew it was a bullet wound but there wasn't time to check the damage. Steve's shield spun past them, taking out whoever had been behind them, and then Steve was there, helping Clint up and Tony was back, firing his blasters. She struggled to her feet, suddenly feeling light-headed and ran for the chopper, grateful Steve could carry Clint.

The three of them collapsed inside the chopper and Steve signaled for the driver to take them up. "On our way out, Tony," he said.

Natasha watched out the open door as Tony fired into the trees a few more times before rising into the air alongside them. Then she looked away. She'd seen as much of that jungle as she ever wanted to.

"You okay?" Steve was asking her.

She shook her head. "I'm fine. Clint's in bad shape," she told him, shifting so that Clint's head could rest comfortably in her lap. She noted with concern that he was no longer conscious. "What are you doing here?"

He shrugged, looking a little embarrassed, and taped a bandage over the wound in her arm. "I heard about the explosion and we … well, we were worried. Agent Coulson said we could ride along to come get you."

Natasha let out a long shaky sigh, her hands over Clint's chest. "I'm glad you did."

He nodded. "Me too. We'll be back at the helicarrier soon and we'll get both of you taken care of."

She leaned her head back against the side of the helicopter, relief and exhaustion combining to darken the edges of her vision. "They gave us something," she mumbled, finding it suddenly difficult to get her mouth to form the words.

"Okay," she heard Steve say as if from far away. "We'll figure it out."

Then she allowed herself to slip away.


	8. Chapter 7

Natasha awoke to darkness. Her stomach clenched and a vague feeling of unease propelled her mind into full wakefulness. Something was wrong but she couldn't remember what. In another moment she realized she was in a hospital, and she looked down at the twin IVs in her arms with annoyance. She felt mostly fine, a little weak maybe, but couldn't feel any pain. Whatever they were giving her was making it difficult to think, and she didn't like that.

"Natasha."

The soft voice coming out of the dark made her suck in a startled breath before she realized it was Phil. She heard him walk over to the door and he turned the lights up just enough for her to see on his face that something was indeed wrong.

"How do you feel?" he asked, coming to stand by the bed, his hands in his pockets.

She watched him for a moment, noting the deep circles under his eyes and his rumpled dress shirt. He wasn't wearing his tie. "I'm fine. What happened?"

He dragged a chair over and collapsed into it. "I could ask you the same thing. What do you remember?"

She thought for a moment, trying to sort through muggy images in her brain. The roof of the Stark tower … heat … gunshots … _Clint._

"Where is he?" she demanded.

"He'll be fine," Phil said. But he didn't look at her when he said it.

"Don't," she said, sitting forward.

He sighed and leaned his elbows on his knees. "I can't give you information I don't have. He's alive, and he'll probably stay that way. But he's not responding to treatment well."

"Treatment for what?" she said, swallowing against sudden nausea.

He looked at her, lips pressed into a thin line. "Why don't you tell me what you remember."

Her fists clenched. "Why did you let them give me drugs?"

"You have malaria, Natasha. And a gunshot wound. I'm afraid they were necessary. If it makes you feel better, Stark and Banner customized the anti-Malarial cocktail."

"How long have we been back?" she asked, ignoring his wry smile.

"Twenty-eight hours. You were both in pretty bad shape."

She frowned, still trying to unscramble the scattered images of the mission she'd been on. Malaria … "Uganda," she muttered, images of that miserable jungle solidifying in her mind.

"The Russians," Phil prompted.

She shot him a glare. "They injected us with malaria."

He nodded. "A particularly virulent strain. Not unlike the airborne version we saw in Kampala." His hands twitched. "And eighteen other locations since."

He looked up at her and she saw a flash of emotion in his eyes. "We found the compound. Order an air strike," she said. It wasn't their fault. They'd been sent in for intel and they'd gotten it.

He rubbed his hands across his slacks. "Things have gotten complicated. We were forced to exchange fire on Ugandan soil. The government is not convinced we did it for the right reasons."

"You're blaming us." Anger welled up in her. Did Phil realize what they'd gone through for S.H.E.I.L.D. in that forest? Had he forgotten that Clint nearly died?

He leaned forward again and she could see the anger in his face. "What I want to know, is how my two best agents got captured by a few jungle terrorists."

"We may have underestimated them," she said, wondering where he was going with this.

"Is that it?"

She glared at him. "What else are you looking for? We made a mistake."

"No one's debating that. I have to know _why _you made a mistake. Why the two of you, together, made such a big mistake."

She suddenly realized what he was dancing around. She ripped her blanket off and turned away from him. "I'm going to see Clint."

"That's not helping your case," he said.

"Maybe you should've just kept your damn promise," she hissed, struggling to get her sore, heavy limbs to function properly.

"I need to know I can trust the two of you together!" he said, and she heard his chair scrape back.

She turned to face him. "That might not matter anymore," she said, forcing a deadly calm into her voice.

They regarded each other in silence until Natasha looked away.

"I can't keep covering for you," he said, more softly this time. "I've always done my best to be honest with you both, and now I need to know. Do you compromise each other? Because that's the only explanation I can come up with for why we're in this mess right now."

She grabbed the edge of the bed and stared at the floor. She had made such a habit of denying her feelings for Clint – even to herself – that to admit them out loud felt like treason. "It was just a mission gone wrong, and it's not the first."

He sighed. "Get some rest, Agent Romanov."

"I want to see Clint."

"He's still in quarantine."

She glanced back at him. "Then I know where to find him."

Phil gave her another long look, sighed and retreated to the door. "I don't need to make this into a fight. I just need it to be made right."

She looked away and waited for him to get a few steps down the hall before sliding both IVs out of her hands. She breathed deeply in the darkness for a moment, still shaking off the effects of the morphine and whatever else they were pumping into her, remembering with a chill the poison the doctors at the Ugandan compound had tried to administer.

Nausea returned as she thought of Clint battling the virus in that horribly humid forest and the terrifying knowledge that she could do almost nothing to help him. She needed to see him.

She felt like she was dragging herself through mud as she swung her legs to the ground and finished disconnecting herself from the monitors, grateful that someone had left her a pair of scrubs to put on. The arm she'd been shot in was stiff and painful as she got dressed but she was never one to stay down longer than she absolutely needed to. She walked from the room, her bare feet soundless on the cold floor.

No one stopped her as she walked through the halls. She realized they were back in the states but she wasn't sure which hospital. Despite her unfamiliarity with the hallways, Clint's room wasn't hard to find. A red sign proclaimed the quarantine his room was still under, but the door was unlocked. The room was strangely cold and the lights were dimmed inside. She paused involuntarily when her eyes adjusted after the bright fluorescence of the hallway and saw her partner. He was surrounded by monitors and IVs, the wires and tubes tangled across his chest. She was relieved to see he wasn't intubated, though an oxygen mask sat loosely over his face. His hair was damp and a thin sheen of sweat covered his exposed skin. His right arm was in a brace, though she suspected it would have to be cast at some point. He was going to love that.

She walked forward and reached out for his left hand, disturbed at the heat she could feel coming off of him. If his fever hadn't gone down since receiving medical attention – over 28 hours – she knew that was a bad sign. Suddenly noticing the weakness in her legs, she sank onto the edge of his bed, watching his face.

"I should have gotten you out sooner," she muttered, hoping he would hear the apology.

And then, not for the first time since they'd been captured, she wondered if Phil was right. Had they been taken by surprise because they were more focused on each other than the mission? She hoped that wasn't true. Because if it was, it was her fault Clint was here now.

"Be okay," she said, so softly she barely heard it herself.

She sat there for a long time, ignoring the pain and fatigue in her own body and holding onto his hand. And finally, he began to stir. His head rolled back and forth on the pillow and his eyebrows drew together in pain. She tightened her grip on his hand and leaned forward.

"Clint," she told him. "We're safe."

His hand gripped hers tightly and with a gasp his eyes flew open. She recognized the panic and the pain in them and flashed a smile at him. His chest heaved with each breath and she could feel his muscles tightening. She kept a hold of his hand and let him attempt to shake off the fear and confusion, but it seemed more difficult for him than usual.

"You with me?" she asked.

He just shook his head, his eyes unfocused. "What ..?" he asked, his voice hoarse and low.

"We were in Uganda," she started. "You have malaria and some broken bones. Do you remember the compound?"

He frowned. "I can't … I don't …"

She was silent, letting him concentrate. But after a couple of shuddering breaths he moaned and squeezed his eyes shut. "Hurts," he gasped.

"What does?" she asked, standing and reaching for the call button.

"Head," he whimpered, his hand closing painfully around hers.

"The doctor is on the way," she told him, the relief she'd felt at seeing him awake quickly dissipating.

Tears trickled from the corners of his closed eyes and his breath came in short pants. "Hurts," he said again, pleading with her to make it stop.

"Hold on, Clint, they're almost here. You've been through worse. Remember when -"

She stopped as his body suddenly went slack and his eyes rolled back in his head. Then all his muscles tensed at once, lifting him off the bed, convulsions tearing through him.

Natasha looked to the door in panic just as a nurse came through it. "Help him!" she said as the assistant rushed toward the bed calling behind her for backup. Clint's body continued to spasm as more nurses and the on-call doctor swarmed the room, pushing Natasha away from the bed. She listened as they called orders back and forth over his body and her breath caught in her chest when someone wheeled a crash cart through the door.

A hand grabbed her good arm and started trying to drag her away, and she tried to detach it but she was shaking too hard.

"Natasha."

It was Phil again.

"Let's stay out of their way, okay? He's going to be okay. Let's go out here," he said, slowly guiding her toward the door. They got into the hallway and she drew a long breath.

"His head," she said, trying to provide some kind of useful information. "Something was wrong."

Phil's hand was still on her arm. "He'll be okay. We'll just stay out here for a minute. Maybe you should sit?"

Her knees took his suggestion seriously and she collapsed against the wall, dragging Phil with her. He managed to slow their descent but still ended up sitting next to her on the floor.

"He was fine just a minute ago," she said. "Well, not _fine_ but he was talking to me. He-"

Phil picked up her hand. "Deep breaths," he ordered, and she realized her lungs were burning.

She took a breath, the rational part of her brain fighting its way through the cloud of her fear.

They sat in tense silence in the hallway until the door opened after what seemed like an eternity. Natasha struggled to her feet as the doctor came outside.

"What happened?" Phil asked before Natasha could get the words out.

"We're not sure," she replied, and Natasha didn't miss the worried frown on her face. "It could be a bleed or damage from the high fever he's been running. Right now he's stable but we need to get a CT scan immediately."

* * *

Dun dun dun... Thank you for your continued support! :D


	9. Chapter 8

Natasha hadn't left Clint's room since he'd returned from the CT scan an hour ago. People had stopped trying to make her go back to her own room but while her glares were effective in getting them to back off, they had been less successful in getting useful information out of the doctors. They determined he'd suffered some kind of trauma to his brain but weren't sure how extensive it was or if it was permanent. And they certainly hadn't settled on the cause. It made her furious.

Currently she was doing all she could not to strangle somebody as the S.H.E.I.L.D doctor assigned to Clint argued heatedly with Tony and Bruce. It sort of helped that Steve was standing right by her, offering his quiet support. It wasn't helping that Phil was pacing back and forth at the edge of her vision.

"For all we know, it could be a negative reaction to the medication you insisted on giving him," Doctor Useless was saying.

"Anti-malarial drugs don't make your brain explode," Tony said, and Natasha winced inwardly, reminding herself that Stark liked to exaggerate.

"It looks like an infection," Bruce said. "Not a bleed. Maybe swelling, but we need to get blood tests."

"It doesn't look like anything I've ever seen before," the doctor said, gesturing at the pictures of Clint's brain on his iPad.

"But it looks most like an infection," Bruce repeated. "It's not unheard of for malaria to cross the blood-brain barrier."

"Not unheard of, but extremely rare. My colleagues agree that it's more likely an effect of the experimental medication!" the doctor argued.

Tony turned to Bruce. "Is he accusing us of experimenting on our team member? Is that what he's doing? Because I don't think he wants to do that." He took a step closer to the doctor. "You don't want to do that, right? 'Cause you know who this guy is, right?"

"Tony," Bruce said, frowning.

The doctor stepped back. "I'm trying to do what's best for my patient. We need to put him on traditional anti-malarial medication immediately."

"Okay, look. Did you even look at the molecular mapping of that virus? Or did you just sleep through basic biochem? Seriously, I don't even know who hired you. Where'd you get your degree, anyway? Did you even -"

"The point is," Bruce interrupted. "It's not a normal malaria virus. If we take him off the specialized medication now he's only going to get worse."

"You can't know that! Listen, neither of you are his doctors, so I'll be making the final call on what's best for Agent Barton, and that's to change his medication and hope you haven't permanently damaged his brain!"

For a moment Natasha thought Stark was going to tackle the man to the ground but Steve waded in, his hand against Tony's chest.

"Hold on!" he shouted, and everyone went still. "Isn't it Clint's decision?"

The doctor scoffed. "He's unable to decide, obviously."

Steve remained patient. "But he must have a living will." He looked at Phil who was staring at the ground.

"He does," he answered. "It's me. He named me his proxy when he first signed up."

"So," Steve said. "You decide on the medication. That's how it works, right?"

The doctor stepped toward Phil. "Agent Coulson, I honestly believe his best chance is taking him off the experimental drug and -"

"Coulson," Tony interrupted. "Who are you gonna trust? This guy is just pissed because we came up with a better drug quicker than he can take a pee."

"You may be Tony Stark but this is my jurisdiction -"

"It'll be much easier if you just admit that I'm a genius and you're just a -"

"Stop," Phil commanded, putting his hands up. "Doctor," he said. "Could you give me a moment with my team."

"Oh, so we're his team now, huh?" Tony muttered as the doctor stormed from the room.

Phil turned to Natasha who remained silent. "What do you think?" he asked her.

She shook her head and glanced at Clint's still face. "I need to know more," she said.

Tony's phone suddenly started chiming and he raised it with a grin. "You're in luck. Jarvis just got us access to all of Clint's medical files. The idiots around here have been trying to keep us in the dark. Saying it's classified, me and Bruce aren't real doctors, blah blah."

"Technically ..." Bruce said wryly.

"Hey, we're better than that guy." He looked up at Natasha. "And we're gonna fix Clint."

Miraculously, Tony Stark's reassurance helped her feel better. She would never in a million years thought that could be the case.

Tony stepped toward Clint's bed and held his phone out, moving it slowly over Clint's body. "We need intel, Jarvis. Give us what you got."

"Sir. Agent Barton's heart rate is slightly elevated but regular. His breathing is hindered by his broken floating rib and cracked eight and ninth ribs. His temperature -"

"Okay, okay. Get to the good stuff. What's the statistically most likely cause for his brain going haywire?" Tony said.

Jarvis was silent for a long moment and Natasha held her breath. "Due to his continued fever and the nature of the CT scans, my best diagnosis is acute encephalitis, sir."

The room fell silent. Natasha wasn't sure what encephalitis was but from the expression on Tony and Bruce's faces it wasn't something good.

"What does that mean?" Steve asked.

Bruce took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. "I told them they needed to test for an infection," he muttered.

Tony glanced at Natasha and she allowed her eyes to beg him for something more. "Jarvis," he said, looking away. "If it's encephalitis, what's the best-case scenario?"

"There is an 11% chance all of Agent Barton's normal functions will return in time. Without more sensitive equipment it is difficult to determine the extent of the damage and impossible to determine the permanence," the AI replied from Tony's phone.

Tony looked up at Phil and Natasha. "You want the other half of this equation? I can tell you it probably isn't pretty."

Natasha nodded once, her arms folded tightly across her chest.

Bruce rubbed the back of his neck. Tony sighed, glancing at Clint. "And the worst, J?"

"There is a 9% chance the infection will spread and damage more of Agent Barton's brain which would likely lead to death. There is a 16% chance his brain is currently so damaged that he will not regain consciousness. There is a 64% chance he will regain partial function."

"What does partial function mean?" Steve said into the silence.

"It could mean anything from decreased motor function to retardation," Bruce said quietly. "We won't know until he wakes up."

"How can you not know?" Natasha finally spoke. "With all the equipment available, you can't look at his brain again and determine if he – if he's going to … How can you not know?"

"The human brain is … it's the most amazing technology there is," Bruce said, staring at Clint. "We're still too far away from understanding it, especially with something so unpredictable as a damaging infection."

"But we don't know that's what it is yet," Tony put in.

"There is a 68% chance Agent Barton has encephalitis," Jarvis put in.

Tony switched his phone off and slid it back into his pocket. "We need to get blood tests. It could be something else. A glitch on the CT scans. The doctor said it was different than anything he's ever seen before. I mean, it could be anything. It doesn't have to be encephalitis."

Tony's earlier reassurances sunk to the bottom of Natasha's stomach. He was scared, and that never bode well.

"I don't want him here," she said. "These doctors have no idea what they're doing."

Tony and Bruce shared a glance. "I don't think it's a good idea to move him yet," Bruce said.

"Romanov, I told you we'd fix him and we will. I'll figure this one out just like I figure everything else out," Tony said, his eyes filled with a rare seriousness.

Banner shook his head. "Tony, you can't promise -"

"I'm going to fix him," he told Bruce fiercely. "When he's more stable we'll move him to the Tower and everything will be okay."

Natasha tried to be comforted by his promise, but she knew how Stark liked to exaggerate. She was horribly certain that nothing was going to be okay.


	10. Chapter 9

For the hundredth time that day, Natasha squeezed Clint's hand and spoke his name, hoping for some sort of coherent response. In the past five days since his seizure at the hospital he'd been mostly comatose, though his fever had finally gone down and they'd been able to move him home to The Tower. Tony had been flying in all kinds of specialists and equipment from the second the blood tests confirmed Jarvis' diagnosis of encephalitis, and while Natasha tried to remind herself how grateful she was for the billionaire's help, the endless debates about what state Clint's brain was in were wearing on her.

And she hadn't seen his eyes in five days.

His hand continued to lay limp in hers as she watched his face for any kind of sign that he was still with her. She had told Phil that they didn't compromise each other, but she felt pretty compromised at the moment. She was constantly distracted, could barely hold a conversation with anyone, couldn't sleep or eat. And it was getting to the point that anyone saying something like "it will be okay" or "we won't know anything until he wakes up" or "if you don't take care of yourself you'll be no good to Clint" made her physically ill.

The door suddenly opened and the Stark family spilled into the room, Felix jabbering away between his parents, clutching the string of a "Get well soon" balloon in his small fist.

Pepper saw her first and smiled gently. "How is he today?" she asked.

Before she could respond, Felix caught sight of her and his face lit up. "Nattie! Is Cwint all better?" he asked. "We got a balloon."

His exuberance was enough to bring something like a smile to her face. "He'll love it," she told him.

"We figured if this kid can't wake him up, nothing will," Tony said, rolling his eyes and looking at Felix with a small smile.

Natasha nodded, feeling too tired to respond with words.

"Oh, you know Dr. Eisen? The neurosurgeon from the UK?" Tony said.

Natasha didn't know. She hadn't cared to keep them all straight.

"He has some idea about node stimulation that he wants to try. He wants to talk with you and Phil about it. Bruce and I think it might be worth a shot. But see what you think."

She nodded again.

Pepper put a hand on Tony's arm. "Happy made some lemon grass tea downstairs," she told Natasha. "I left a cup in your room if you want a break."

Natasha attempted a smile and stood, glancing once more at Clint before moving past the family to the door. She walked down the hallway trying to decide if she was grateful to leave the room or not. She decided she was equal parts guilty and relieved and then decided not to let herself even think about it anymore. She stepped into the elevator and slumped against the wall, hoping she wouldn't run into anyone else before making it to her room.

Her wish was granted, and she collapsed on her bed, noting the cup of tea placed carefully on her nightstand. She picked it up and allowed the cup to warm her hands before taking a sip. Then, placing the cup back on the nightstand with a small click, she curled up on her bed and closed her eyes.

* * *

He felt like drowning was the only thing he'd ever known. Sounds, hurts, weariness, all washed over him in wave after numbing wave and he was unable to surface, unable to draw a clear breath. And there was an endless underlying terror that he was trapped in this inglorious in-between forever.

But … voices. At first they were part of the ongoing rumble that was far above him, indecipherable and intangible. Then they began to get clearer. For once he could distinguish actual voices, though he couldn't understand the words – there were people somewhere. He concentrated, though the pain made it difficult, wanting to tighten his grasp on the sounds before they could slip away from him like they had before. The voices began to grow louder and more distinct and he wanted to scream out to them, beg them to stay until he could get himself to the surface.

There was an ache somewhere in his body, and something was moving near him. And the smell of … he didn't know what it was called. He didn't know if he'd ever smelled it before. It was distinct. It was driving him insane, not knowing. But it brought him closer to the voices.

"... kidding?"

"No, honey, it's fine. I'll teach him how to use it!"

"Tony, he's three. He's barely three."

"He has excellent motor control for his age! And I didn't include the weapons, obviously. I don't understand what you're so worried about."

"Oh, so no weapons, but he'll be able to fly off – literally fly off – to who knows where?"

"_Low-powered_ thrusters! How many times do I have to say it?"

The words piled up in his head and he couldn't understand what they meant all together. But they were clear, and that was improvement.

There was a sudden pressure against his side and accompanying pain. It made him aware of his own mass and other distinct pains began vying for his attention, and still, that smell.

"Felix! You're going to hurt him. Stay over on this side or you have to get down, remember?"

The pressure receded but the hurt remained. He tried to make some kind of motion or sound but couldn't seem to remember how to do either. He struggled, focusing on the pain as the only points of reference to the physical world he had at the moment, trying to orient himself, trying to understand what was happening.

"Tony? What's going on?"

"Didn't you hear that? His heart rate just jumped up."

"What does that mean? Do we need to – Felix, get off of him! Do I need to call the doctor or-"

"There, see? See that! Look right there at his brain activity."

"Is that good? That's good right? He's waking up?"

There was silence and he felt something … pressure, but not pain. Something … someone was holding tightly to his hand.

"Clint?" the higher voice asked. "Can you hear me? Squeeze my hand if you can hear me, okay?"

He understood what the voice was asking of him, but he couldn't comply the way he wanted to. If he didn't let them know he was here, would he sink back down? He could feel the hand around his, could make sense of his own hand, but it didn't quite feel like it belonged to him.

"C'mon, you can do it. I know you're still in there," the other voice said.

There was movement on his other side, and sudden pain. He felt his hands tighten reflexively and a small gasp escaped his lips.

"Felix!"

"Clint!"

"Okay, get down, little man -"

"Clint, we're right here, squeeze again for me, okay? Felix, carefully!"

"I wanna see!" Another voice wailed, almost right in his ear.

And then he opened his eyes.

The light was dizzying and he dropped his eyelids again, but the brief glimpse he'd gotten was so refreshing despite the pain it caused in his head that he was willing to try again. And he had to see who was making all the noise. Had to see the voices that had brought him back.

He risked cracking them open again, ignoring for now the excited talking that was happening above him, and focused on the blur in front of him, the smell he'd first smelled growing stronger.

"Unca Cwint?" the blur said, as two brown eyes and an unruly head of reddish hair came into view. "You all better?" Peanut butter. It was peanut butter that he could smell.

He blinked a few times, but the images in front of him were swimming in and out of focus.

"Jarvis, get Natasha and Dr. Eisen up here. Phil, everybody."

"Yes, sir," an entirely new, strange voice said.

"His heart rate is still climbing, Tony. Felix, honey, let's get down." The blur in front of Clint disappeared, but not quietly.

"I wanna pway with Cwint!"

"Yeah, hey Clint, everything's okay." Someone else was hovering over him. "Take some deep breaths, buddy."

He realized the voice was talking to him and he tried to comply, sucking air in, but it was too much, too far, and the pain in his side intensified. He let the breath out, surprised, gasping, his eyes squeezed back shut.

"Easy, easy. You still have broken ribs." He felt a hand on his shoulder, pressing gently. "Where does it hurt the most? You want more meds?"

"Tony, maybe we should back off a little, his heart rate -"

The hand left his shoulder and he wanted to scream. _Don't leave!_ But he couldn't make his mouth work. His eyes stuttered open again, and he took another breath, slower this time. He heard sudden noises farther away and suddenly there were more people in the room. His eyes were still having a difficult time focusing, and it didn't help when someone rushed over to shine lights into them and poke at him, and there were suddenly too many blurs to distinguish surrounding him and all of them were making noise and touching him, and he couldn't make sense of any of it anymore.

There was a sudden shout, and the noise died down. He realized his eyes were shut again, but the sudden silence scared him enough to open them again. If he was alone he might go back to that place that was so difficult to get out of.

"Clint." A new voice, a new hand touching his. There was only one blur remaining now, and he concentrated on focusing his eyes.

Her face was beautiful. But she looked so tired, so scared. And somehow happy. All of those things were in her eyes as she touched his face.

"Are you okay?"

He wanted to answer her, but it was all he could do to keep his breath moving in and out and his eyes open.

Her thumb wiped something wet off his cheek. "It's going to be fine."

Suddenly feeling calm, he allowed his eyes to slide shut, and he slipped off into a comforting darkness. And this time he was floating, not drowning.

* * *

Thank you so much for your reviews and follows and favorites! I was just thinking today how awesome of an experience I've had on this website. I have honestly never had anything but positive encounters with people so THANK YOU! It makes this so much fun. :)


	11. Chapter 10

"Ready … set... go!"

Two miniature cars raced down the tiled hallway outside Clint's bedroom away from Tony and Felix, Tony's taking the turn into the common room more smoothly than Felix's.

"Daddy!" Felix squealed as Tony bumped his car into his son's.

"Better watch it, buddy," Tony said, his thumbs easily manipulating the controller.

Felix steered his own car toward Tony's as the cars made a wide loop around the coffee table but Tony evaded him.

"Nice try," Tony said, chuckling.

"Wait for me!" Felix pleaded as his car made a turn too sharply and his car bounced off a chair.

"No waiting, this is a real race," Tony said, drawing back just a little on the throttle.

The cars headed back into the hallway, neck and neck toward the finish line, but Clint's door suddenly opened, knocking into Tony's car as Natasha came out.

"Stark!" she exclaimed, her face stormy. "Get your stupid toys out of the hallway!"

"Hey, watch it," Tony said, glancing at Felix.

"I'm sorry," she said coldly. "Get your stupid toys out of the hallway _please."_

She stalked away, and Tony bit his lip, letting her go because he knew exactly what her problem was. Clint wasn't doing as well as they'd all hoped he would. It had been three days since he woke up, but he was still more often unconscious than not, and had yet to utter a coherent word to any of them. The specialists said that it was fairly normal behavior for someone recovering from that kind of trauma, but everyone in the Tower was thinking the same three, terrifying words: permanent brain damage. And Natasha wasn't taking it well.

"Daddy?" Felix said, his little voice full of confusion. He came to stand next to Tony, leaning against his leg. Tony looked down at him, and the little boy looked back with tear-filled eyes.

"C'mere, buddy," Tony said, lifting his son to his hip. Felix wrapped both arms around his neck and pressed his face into his shoulder. "You're not in trouble. Natasha is just upset because of Uncle Clint," he assured him.

"Unca Cwint be all better?" Felix asked softly, his voice thick with tears.

Tony frowned, hating that his little buddy was also feeling the strain. "He's going to be fine, sweetheart. We just have to be patient, okay?"

Felix nodded, keeping his head on Tony's shoulder for another moment before pointing to Clint's door.

"You want to go see him? Yeah, we can do that," Tony said, carrying him over. "But he might be sleeping."

They entered the room, and Clint's eyes were indeed closed, though his face was less pale than it had been when Tony had seen him yesterday. As they came over to the bed, Clint opened his eyes, apparently not sleeping very deeply.

"Hey," Tony said, shooting him a smile. "The little man here wanted to come say hi."

Felix leaned toward Clint and Tony set him down on the edge of the bed. "Hi, Unca Cwint," he said, opening and closing his small fist in a half-hearted wave.

The corner of Clint's mouth turned up as he looked at the little boy.

"You know," Tony said, settling back into the chair that was always at his bedside. "Bruce and I are working on that laser arrow we talked about before you left. It's gonna be ready before your arm is out of the cast, but don't worry, we'll save it."

Clint's eyes were on him, his brow furrowed.

"Unca Cwint, pway a game?" Felix asked hopefully, holding his hand out.

"He still doesn't have his phone on him, buddy," Tony said.

Felix watched Clint for a moment before an idea crossed his face. "Daddy! Cars!" He slid off the bed and scampered out of the room.

"Felix, where are you - ugh. Okay, sit tight, be right back," Tony said getting up to follow him. But he didn't have to go far.

Felix raced back in, holding the remote car he'd been driving moments before. "Wanna try?" he asked Clint, reaching up to put the remote against Clint's left hand.

Clint smiled and Tony watched him reach for the remote.

"Hey, good idea," Tony said approvingly. Clint hadn't been able to do much of anything since waking up, so Tony was happy to see him moving. "See, just a little longer and you'll be down on the range with us. You gotta see these new things, man. I had this idea - we had this idea - okay, really it was me, to put in a …"

Tony was still explaining the new tech he was working on and Felix had taken over the car remote when Pepper found them, walking into the room with her usual smile.

"Hey, Clint," she said warmly, touching his arm.

"Momma, watch!" Felix exclaimed from his perch on Clint's bed. He zoomed the little car around the room, ending with a painful collision with Pepper's ankle.

She hid her wince and kissed the little boy. "You're getting better," she told him.

"See? Excellent motor control," Tony said smugly. "Clint drove it for a while, too."

Her smile grew. "Really? You look like you're feeling better today," she said, looking at the archer.

He smiled, his eyes focused, and opened his mouth as if he was trying to speak, but was only able to get out a low rasp.

Tony and Pepper shared an excited glance. "Let me get you some water," Pepper said.

He drank gratefully, and cleared his throat, for once since the rescue seeming lucid. He tried to speak again, his mouth moving around the words but nothing intelligible escaping.

"You got this, Legolas," Tony said, leaning forward. "It's just talking. I know you didn't do it much before your brain trauma, but that's no excuse."

"_You_ have no problem with it," Pepper muttered sweetly.

He ignored her, his attention focused on Clint.

Clint frowned, trying again. "Wh-who …"

Tony grinned excitedly. "Yeah, you got it! Who's the thirteenth president of the US? Who was buried in Grant's Tomb? What?"

"Wh - who are ... you?"

The grin dropped from Tony's face and he stared in surprise. "Who … who am I?"

There was a soft knock on the door and they looked up to see Dr. Eisen standing in the doorway with a solemn expression. "I need to speak with you for a moment," he said.

* * *

Tony never had a hard time talking. He loved it, he used it, he was exceptional at it, like everything else. But this conversation was proving difficult. His friends, the people he'd come to actually, legitimately care about - Phil, Bruce, Steve, Thor - were all staring at him with concern. They were waiting for bad news. And he was going to have to give it to them.

"Good news or bad news first?" he asked, shifting in his favorite chair down on the main level common room, trying to seem like he didn't care as much as he did. Trying to keep the fear out of his voice. No one answered because they saw right through him. He swallowed. "Okay, I can pick, that's great. I'll pick good. So, I was talking to Clint today," he faltered for just a moment on his friend's name. "And uh, he actually talked back. He was in there, so that's a breakthrough. It's huge. He can talk! I'm not hearing cheers here, people."

Pepper looked at him with tears in her eyes. "Tony," she said.

Tony rubbed his forehead, letting out a breath. "Okay, so, bad news." He cleared his throat, willing the emotions coursing through him to stay tamped down, at least while he was in front of the team. "I spoke with Dr. Eisen, and he … he showed me Clint's scan from this morning." Everyone remained silent, even though he was practically begging them to interrupt. "I guess he was finally able to determine the extent of the damage to his brain, and uh, so, he has permanent memory loss."

His words fell into the quiet like a cannonball.

"How much?" Phil ventured quietly, and Tony envied him his calm mask.

Tony hesitated, looking at Pepper. Which was a mistake because she was still crying and that wasn't making anything easier. "All of it," he told them. "He doesn't remember anything. Not us, not S.H.I.E.L.D., not anything."

"They're sure it's permanent?" Phil said.

"They're sure. The doctor thought in previous scans that it had the potential to heal, but apparently that possibility is gone as of this morning."

Phil nodded and stood up, pulling out his phone.

"Coulson," Bruce said warily, watching the agent.

Phil glanced back at him and moved toward the elevator.

Bruce looked at Steve. "If he tells Fury what happened, Clint will become a liability to S.H.I.E.L.D."

Steve frowned. "And then?"

Bruce grimaced. "They might decide he needs to be in a more secure location."

Tony gave a short humorless laugh. "Yeah, they can try."

"Phil won't let anything happen," Pepper said, somewhere between a statement and a question.

Tony shook his head angrily. "Anything besides Clint losing his memory you mean?"

Silence fell again, as they exchanged worried frowns.

"Where's Natasha?" Steve said suddenly, his eyes clouded with sorrow.

Pepper spoke up then, her voice controlled despite her red eyes. "In the gym. We thought … we didn't know how best to tell her."

Bruce was looking at Tony. "You mean you're scared to tell her?"

Tony's gaze held his for a moment. "Yeah. Yeah, we're scared. This is bad, okay? She's not going to - she might not -"

Thor stood suddenly from the couch. "She should know."

"Well, yeah, we all agree that she should know, it's just … _I_ don't want to be the one to tell her okay?" Tony sputtered. "I promised her I would fix him, and I didn't." He rubbed a hand over his face, pressing his lips into a tight line. "So I don't want to be the one to tell her."

There was a long sigh from Bruce. "It's not your fault, Tony. We did everything we -"

"I know it's not my fault!" he said, his head snapping up. "It's those idiot doctors who wouldn't look for an infection when we _told _them to." He was on his feet now, pacing back and forth. "We told them! It was an infection _not_ the drugs but they didn't listen so it's _their _fault, not mine."

"Tony," Pepper said again, causing him to pause for a moment.

"Who's going to tell her, then?" Steve said, in that disturbingly calm voice he had that meant he was in crisis mode.

The room was quiet, and everyone started to look toward Phil, he was the one who had known both her and Clint the longest after all, but Thor spoke.

"I … have some experience with the things she will be feeling," he said sadly. "Losing someone to a diseased mind is different than other types of loss. I will speak with her."

Steve stood next to him. "I'll go with you if you want."

Thor put a hand on his shoulder, smiling slightly. "You should remain here," he said, his eyes flicking toward Tony, and disappeared down the hall.

* * *

**Daddy Tony is my favorite Tony. Emotional Tony is pretty high on the list, too. :)**


	12. Chapter 11

"Natasha."

Her hand faltered the tiniest bit when Thor's solemn voice spoke her name, but she emptied her clip, glaring as her grouping became wider than she preferred.

Silence echoed through the range and she reached for another clip, unable to face her teammate.

He remained standing quietly behind her as she emptied the next clip, her shots going from a tight cluster to haphazard loose circles. She cursed under her breath, her hands shaking as she removed the empty cartridge and reached for another.

But Thor's large hand covered her's on the counter and held it. "Natasha," he said again, his voice heavy. "They have determined that the infection Agent Barton has endured has damaged his mind."

Clint's name sent a painful jolt through her and the only thing keeping her from flying apart right then was the warmth of Thor's hand over hers.

"He no longer has his memories," he said, speaking more softly than she'd ever heard him speak. "And the doctors think it unlikely he will ever regain them."

Natasha drew in a long, slow breath, trying to slow the trembling in her body. She couldn't say she was shocked. She'd known something was seriously wrong since she'd seen Phil's face when she'd first woken up. But to hear it confirmed was more than she could stand. "Are they sure?" she asked, both relieved and disturbed to hear how steady her voice was.

"They say the damage is irreversible," he replied with infinite sadness.

She pulled her hand away from Thor's and reloaded her gun, slamming the clip in with exaggerated precision and bringing the gun up, unloading the clip without pausing, trying to let her emotions go with the bullets.

Thor stood there still. "Do you wish to go to him?" he asked.

She ejected the clip. _What's the point_? she thought. _What's the point in seeing him if he's already gone?_

The thought knocked the air out of her like a physical blow and she dropped the gun, hunched over, gripping the edge of the counter. Pain welled up, choking her, swallowing her. She clenched her jaw, fighting the tears welling up in her eyes.

Thor brought his other hand up to hold her shoulder, standing with her in silence and she tried to let herself draw strength from him. She would need to be strong for Clint. She owed him that much.

"I know the pain of a loved one becoming irreversibly changed," he said quietly, his voice strained.

He did. She knew he did. She took another deep breath and straightened, pulling away from Thor. "Thank you for telling me," she said, unable to quite meet his eyes. If she saw the understanding she knew would be there she wasn't sure if she would sob or punch him. She swept past him instead, knowing that if she didn't swallow her despair and go see Clint now, she might not ever get up the courage.

Her heart was sinking even as she rode the elevator up to the residential levels but by the time she reached Clint's door, alone, she was almost composed. She took another deep breath, forced a smile onto her face, and opened the door.

He was awake, and looked over at her, his face clear of delirium, and attentive for the first time since Uganda. But there was no recognition in his pale eyes.

She didn't allow her smile to falter, her training had given her that at least, and walked into the room stopping a few feet from his bedside. "I'm Natasha," she said. " We used to be partners."

A polite smile lifted the corners of his mouth. "Hey," he said, his voice hoarse. "They tell me my name's Clint."

The last vestiges of her shattered heart splintered into a million irreparable pieces.

* * *

She didn't stay long. There wasn't much to talk about after all, and she discovered she couldn't quite look him in his eyes. The eyes that didn't recognize her. She had thought in the back of her mind that when he saw her it would all come flooding back to him, but now she was laughing at herself. That kind of romantic notion wasn't the kind of thinking the Black Widow should engage in.

Sometimes she hated being the Black Widow.

She found herself on the roof of the tower, where they'd come the night before their ill-fated mission. A sudden surge of anger swelled up as she remembered Phil's apologetic smile as he'd told them he needed them for another assignment. He had promised.

But the logical side of her told her that she had promised, too. She had promised to be loyal to S.H.I.E.L.D. And she had done it because she wanted to do good in the world. And she'd done it knowing that sacrifices would have to be made. That's what the logical side of her, the Black Widow side said. But as much as she was the Black Widow, she was Natasha too. And Natasha was devastated.

She sat in the fading light, hugging her knees and thinking the sunset had been much more beautiful that night with Clint. She regretted they hadn't had time to stay until the stars started to come out so she waited, picking out the few constellations she could with the interference of all the light from the city.

She was carefully ignoring the cold that was creeping in now that the sun was down when the door behind her opened. She didn't turn to see who it was, didn't care. She didn't want to talk to anyone.

She felt a blanket being draped around her shoulders and knew it was Steve. He sat down next to her with a little sigh, and she didn't look at him.

"Getting cold," he said after a moment.

She pressed her lips together. "I'm fine."

He gave a short, humorless laugh. "None of us are fine."

That was true, she was sure. She could only imagine how the others were reacting.

"You know," he started again. "They say practice makes perfect, but that isn't always true. I'm pretty well-practiced at losing people, but somehow... I never get good at it. I still feel helpless. I still say the wrong things at the wrong times. And … it still hurts. More than it should after all this time."

She looked over sharply but remained silent.

Steve was watching the sky, seeing something from another time, his hands limp in his lap. "You would think, by now, I would've found a way to stop it from hurting at least."

"The trick is not caring in the first place," she managed.

He glanced at her. "Yeah. Haven't figured out how to do that either."

They fell back into silence, and she tucked the blanket more tightly around herself. "What's Phil going to do?"

He didn't answer for a long moment. "He talked to Fury, I know that much. For now, Clint can stay here. Phil wants Fury to consider re-training him but …"

"That's not how S.H.I.E.L.D works," she said bitterly.

"No," Steve agreed softly. "We'll take it one day at a time, Nat." She nodded and he got up. "Don't stay out here all night, okay?"

She nodded again, keeping her eyes on the stars.

* * *

***sniff* That was a sadder chapter than I remembered. Poor Nat. The angst will continue tomorrow... **

**Thank you all for reviewing and reading and enjoying this story with me!**


	13. Chapter 12

The atmosphere in The Tower was heavy. They were a group of people used to being able to do something, and in the face of Clint's memory loss they were completely helpless. They told him what they could, hoping that something would come back to him, but Phil had told them that the only way Fury would allow him to stay in the tower was if he knew nothing about his previous status as an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. and an Avenger.

None of them liked it. They did their best not to lie to him, but he started asking questions about his past before long, and they were forced to get creative. And Clint bore it all with confused looks and frequent apologies. The apologies were the worst part. "He never used to do that before," Tony grumbled to Pepper often. "What does he think he has to be sorry about?"

Tony and Bruce continued researching and working with Clint's doctors, but the more they found out, the more hopeless it seemed, and the more frustrated they got.

Steve was unendingly patient with Clint, spending as much time with the still bedridden archer as possible, and answering as many questions as he could. Pepper reminded Tony it was because Steve knew what it was like to wake up and be completely lost in the world you found yourself in. Tony replied that it was just because Steve never liked missing an opportunity to prove he was better than the rest of humanity.

Thor had returned to Asgard in hopes of finding a cure there, but even he hadn't seemed particularly hopeful.

And Natasha stayed away from Clint as much as possible. She only saw him every few days and could hardly exchange any words with him, which the rest of the team could tell was difficult for both of them. She confused Clint, and he asked the rest of them about her, but they didn't dare try and explain Clint and Natasha's past to him. They told him he would have to wait for her to come around.

The days passed slowly. There were physical therapists to help Clint regain the use of his damaged arm and leg, and more brain scans just in case, and life steadily, relentlessly returned to some semblance of normalcy.

* * *

Tony poured cereal for Felix and coffee for himself, muttering about the ridiculousness of a three-year-old who insisted on waking up before eight AM and a wife who was off to work before that. Felix was not muttering at all, but humming to himself from his booster seat at the table, his feet swinging merrily.

"Dad, I had a dream," he announced suddenly.

Tony put the little boy's bowl of Fruit Loops in front of him and sipped his coffee wincing as the hot liquid scalded his tongue. "Gah. Eat all the colors. Okay, so, you had a dream?"

He wandered back across the kitchen, blueprints for his next project unfolding in his head as Felix described his dream.

"There was a monster that eated me and even a zombie."

"Zombie, huh?" Tony repeated absently, sitting next to Felix at the table.

"Yeah, but Unca Cwint shooted it."

"Shot. What about the monster?"

"He eated bweakfast. Hi, Unca Cwint."

Tony looked up, his eyes widening in surprise to see Clint standing by the counter, a crutch propped under his good arm.

"Oh, hey, are you - should you be up? You can have some fruit loops, if you want. Have some, probably don't remember the taste, so it'll be a great experience," Tony rambled. It was the first time he'd seen Clint up and around since before he got hurt and it was oddly disconcerting.

"The physical therapist said I should start walking around," he said, and it sounded like another apology.

Tony forced a smile on his face. "Take a seat," he said, standing and pulling a chair out. "Unless you wanted to head downstairs and finish Steve's morning marathon with him."

Clint smiled a little and took the offered chair. "I think I'll pass."

"So," Tony said, trying not to feel awkward. For some reason it had been easier to talk to him when he was still in bed. Maybe because he looked less like himself laying down so the not-acting-like-himself part had been less incongruous. "Feeling better? Headaches going away like Dr. Eisen said they would?"

Clint, (or as Tony now usually thought of him, the person who used to be Clint but still is in a way) nodded. "Yeah, it's getting a lot better."

"Want to see my newest toy? You gave me the idea, actually," he said, fishing his phone out of his pocket and placing it on the table. The phone's 3D projector conjured the image of a bow. "It's one-handed, if you can believe it," Tony said proudly. "When you first … hurt your arm, Bruce and I thought we should start working on one just in case."

Clint watched the image curiously. "So, archery? I used to do archery?"

_For the love._ Tony let his mouth hang open in shock. "Uh, yeah. No one's told you? How can this not have come up? My friend, you were the best."

Clint frowned, just the tiniest bit. "I wish …"

Tony swallowed and cleared the image. "You wish you'd known that before you signed up for basket-weaving classes? Well, you never know. Maybe archery isn't your true calling."

Clint smiled again. "Thanks for telling me. It's nice to know, you know, stuff like that."

"All done!" Felix suddenly exclaimed, pushing his bowl toward Tony and sliding down from his chair. Tony did not fail to notice he'd only eaten the red and yellow ones. "Unca Cwint, wanna pway?" the little boy asked, going around to Clint's chair.

"Buddy, Clint's probably tired so go find Bruce or somebody, okay?" Tony said, knowing Clint's previous aversion to children, even Felix.

"No, it's okay," Clint said. "What do you want to play?"

To Tony's surprise, Clint limped after Felix back to his room. Yeah, the new Clint was going to take some getting used to.

* * *

As much as Tony was struggling to handle his emotions regarding the "new Clint," Natasha wasn't dealing at all. She kept herself removed from everyone, and on the few occasions she was around Clint, she remained distant and disturbingly calm.

Pepper could see what was happening, could understand it. She knew it was easier for Natasha to pretend like Clint's memory loss wasn't affecting her, but Pepper had known Tony for a long time and knew what that kind of denial would eventually do to a person. So she took Natasha out for coffee one morning.

They went to a pleasant little bistro not far from The Tower and Pepper turned her phone off before ordering her peppermint mocha cappuccino.

She could feel Natasha watching her as she took a sip and knew the other woman wasn't buying her casual act. She looked over her cup across the table. Natasha was smiling slightly and she took a sip of her own drink.

"This is nice," she said, and Pepper was definitely smart enough to catch that hint of sarcasm.

She put down her cup. "I thought you could use some time away," she explained.

Natasha's eyes flicked to the side, suddenly pained. "Yeah."

"Natasha, I know that things are … hard right now. And I'm not going to tell you to focus on the fact that Clint is still alive, or that his injuries could be worse than they are."

Natasha scoffed. "Good. No one's tried those with me yet for a reason."

"I invited you out for coffee because we're friends, and I don't let my friends go through something like this alone, even if they want me to," Pepper said, smiling slightly.

Natasha's face softened just a little and she took a sip of her coffee. "I haven't found anything that helps yet. I doubt it's going to be coffee."

Pepper's smile grew into a genuine one. "You never know. The pumpkin spice lattes here are really very good."

Natasha frowned down at the table. "He used to love those."

Pepper stayed quiet, surprised her friend was mentioning Clint willingly.

"I would always make fun of him for ordering girly drinks," she continued, turning her cup in her hands.

"He asks about you, you know," Pepper said gently when it became clear that Natasha wasn't going to divulge further. "He understands that the two of you have a connection, even if he can't remember what it is."

Natasha's hands tightened around her cup and she glanced up. "That doesn't help either."

Pepper bit her lip, watching Natasha cover her pain as best she could. "I can't imagine what you're going through."

"Now that, they have tried." She stood, obviously about to leave. "I know you're trying to help, all of you are trying to help, but please stop it."

Pepper stood too, never one to back down. "Natasha, if you keep shutting us out, and Clint, you're going to end up hurting even more than you are now."

Natasha looked at her with fire in her eyes. "You don't know anything about hurting."

That stung. Did she really think that Clint's injury wasn't affecting all of them? That everything Pepper had been through with Tony had been painless? "I care about Clint, too," she said.

Natasha took a step toward her, her body radiating tension. "But you didn't know him." And she turned and walked out of the bistro.

* * *

**Let them love you, Nat! Sigh. I hope you're still enjoying this! It's all written so I can't guarantee being able to work in specific requests, but if you have anything you'd like to see, I'll do my best. :)  
**


	14. Chapter 13

Phil sat in the dark swirling his drink in his hand. It was late, he wasn't even sure what time it was, and The Tower was quiet, filled with the heavy silence that had become common.

Phil had always cared too much about people. He knew it. According to some it was his biggest shortcoming. He'd always liked to think of it as one of his strengths, but that wasn't what it felt like tonight. Tonight he wished he could stop caring. He didn't want to feel like the disastrous Uganda mission was solely on his shoulders. He didn't want to feel the sinking, terrifying ache that signaled the loss of the two agents he cared about the most. He didn't want to feel so completely helpless. That wasn't who Phil Coulson was. Phil Coulson fixed things, he found a way, he took care of his people.

But not this time. This time he had failed them. He lifted his glass to his lips, barely noticing the burn of alcohol in his throat and with the other hand, found himself reaching for one of Tony's ever-present tablets lying on the coffee table in front of him.

He set it in his lap and turned it on with a swipe of his finger, wondering with self-derision why he had even come here. He came at night when there was less chance to run into anyone, and Jarvis always let him in without any questions. He suspected he had Pepper to thank for that and he was grateful, because even though his guilt made it difficult to be in the presence of The Avengers lately, when he wasn't at The Tower he felt like he was abandoning them.

He found Clint's S.H.I.E.L.D. file without allowing himself to think too much about why Tony had access to classified documents and stared down at Clint's recrutement date, there by his age and height and weight, as much a part of him as those things were. Phil remembered that day. He remembered thinking he had saved the young archer.

He brought up Clint's test videos, shaking his head at the smirk on his friend's face as he took shot after impossible shot with his bow. Even Fury had been surprised at his test scores in marksmanship, coordination, and reaction times. Then he'd surprised them again with the written portions of the S.H.I.E.L.D. tests, exhibiting a high IQ and nearly perfect score on the analytics section.

When Phil had first talked to Fury after they learned Clint's memory loss was permanent, Fury wanted to re-test him, see how much he had retained. Phil knew what he really meant was he wanted to see if Clint was still worth S.H.E.I.L.D.'s time or if he was now just an unstable liability. Phil was almost grateful that Fury wasn't giving up completely on the archer, but he couldn't get past the fact that it was impossible for things to return to the way they were.

With another few touches he brought up a video taken of Clint in action on one of his first command missions. He didn't prefer being lead on missions, but on this one he was nearly flawless. He had planned and prepared every second and his team trusted him; Phil could see it in the way they responded to his commands. But there are always unknown variables and the whole thing went sideways. Two of his teammates were trapped behind more enemies than they could hope to fight their way out of, but Clint fought his way to them. He fired every last arrow and then used the bow as a sword, cutting his way through them fiercely, leaving twenty men or more in his wake.

"So that's what no one will tell me about."

The voice startled Phil and he turned sharply in his chair. Clint stood behind him, confusion and apprehension looking misplaced on the confident archer's face. They watched each other for a moment, then Phil set his glass down and spoke. "You weren't supposed to see that."

Clint looked down, sighing heavily. Phil couldn't tell if he was angry or disappointed or something else. He didn't look up.

"I'm sorry," Phil found himself saying, watching the slumped shoulders of his friend. "We weren't allowed to tell you. It's … classified."

Clint shook his head, still staring at the ground.

"It's my fault," Phil found himself saying. "I sent you there."

Clint looked up, his gaze falling on the dark screen of the tablet. "There? To kill people?"

Phil started to shake his head, but he _had _sent Clint on that mission. To kill people. Because it was one of the things he was very good at. "That was a long time ago. I meant that I sent you to Uganda."

"The doctors told me it was malaria that turned into encephalitis."

Phil nodded, forcing himself to look Clint in the eyes. "It was. Natasha got you out but …"

"Natasha was there?"

Phil nodded. "She had your back. You did that a lot for each other."

Clint grimaced. "She won't talk to me. Well, no one really does, but when she sees me ..." he drew in a breath.

"You were close," Phil admitted. "She's having a hard time with this."

Clint looked at him steadily. "Is that your excuse too?"

Phil's eyes were suddenly burning. He swallowed, his hands clenched around the tablet. Phil wanted to tell him everything, make him understand why it was so difficult to have these conversations. But the only thing standing between Clint and a padded S.H.I.E.L.D. cell was his ignorance. "It's a period of adjustment," he forced himself to say.

Clint looked up, his jaw clenched. "You know, I'm not sure I want to know. I don't know how to think of myself. I don't know if I was good or bad or if I should be proud of the things I've done or not." He shrugged helplessly. "So is that part of this _period of adjustment_?"

He stood there, looking less angry and more afraid and Phil's eyes slid away from him. "Even if you never remember them, you should be proud of the things you've accomplished."

He heard Clint scoff and looked back in time to see him turn away in defeat. "I'll be sure and tell myself that when I think about all those people I killed."

_But there's so many more that you saved_, Phil thought, listening to the tap of Clint's crutches recede down the hallway.

* * *

"You should talk to him."

Natasha's hands slowed a fraction of a second, her rhythm on Tony's wooden dummy faltering.

Phil sighed and continued. "I know I'm the last person you want to take advice from, and Natasha, I'm sorry."

There was a shake in his voice and she gave up on the dummy, resting her hands against its smooth trunk.

"But for his sake, you have to talk to him. He's picking up on the things we aren't saying and it's hurting him."

"What did he say to you?" she asked quietly.

Phil didn't answer and she looked up to see him watching her with eyes full of the same pain she'd been shouldering. "He doesn't understand who he was and it's tearing him apart," he said. "He saw footage from the Kuwait mission in 2006."

Sudden tension coiled through her stomach. S.H.I.E.L.D. was allowing Clint to stay at The Tower on one condition. "Does Fury know?"

Phil shook his head. "No, and I'll keep it that way. It was my fault Clint saw the footage."

"What'd you tell him?"

"I couldn't tell him anything. Besides, after seeing that, he doesn't want to know what else he's done."

Natasha narrowed her eyes. "He saved an entire village on that mission."

Phil regarded her. "He needs you to tell him that. I think he understands how close you used to be to each other. He trusts you."

For the first time since Uganda, she thought she might agree with him.

* * *

**For the record, I love Phil. I don't know how he turned out to be kind of the bad guy in this story, but I promise he loves them very much. :)  
**


	15. Chapter 14

She found him in the common room the next morning with Felix and Pepper. None of them noticed her as she stopped and watched from a distance as Clint played one of Tony's custom holographic games, sitting on the floor with his bad leg awkwardly stretched out. Felix was giggling as Clint teased him, and for a moment Natasha couldn't move. Clint's smile as he played with the little boy was something she had never seen before. Of course Clint had smiled before but it was never with such … freedom. She watched, too startled to look away. It was in his eyes. They weren't haunted or wary. Just happy. Suddenly she envied him.

"Natasha, hi!" Pepper said in surprise.

Natasha's gaze snapped away from Clint and she assumed a small smile so Pepper wouldn't ask if she was okay.

"Nattie, come pway!" Felix implored, waving her over with a small hand.

She started to shake her head but Clint was looking at her with that smile and she wanted to be near him and pretend that everything was alright. So she walked over before Pepper could tell Felix that she was probably busy and sat down on the floor, Clint scooting over to make room for her next to the little boy.

"Show me," she told Felix, smiling.

He grinned widely, his small body humming with delight and showed her how to play the game, his chubby fingers flicking the little holograms around as he chattered at her.

Pepper watched her over Felix's head looking like it was Christmas morning and when Clint's arm brushed Natasha's, the assassin had to consciously stop her flinch.

"He's winning," Clint told her as the little boy wrapped up his instructions and plopped himself in Natasha's lap.

She nodded, glancing at her former partner. "He usually does." The sudden memory of Felix beating Clint's high score on the rooftop came to her so suddenly she sucked in a pained breath.

No one seemed to notice and Natasha was grateful.

"Sometimes he even beats Tony on this one," Pepper said with a fond smile, taking her turn.

Felix started giggling wildly. "No, Mommy! Gotta go _there_!" he said, fixing whatever she'd done wrong.

Clint chuckled and reached out to ruffle the little boy's hair with his good arm. Natasha closed her eyes for a moment. His laugh sounded the same and different and she couldn't decide which she preferred.

"Your turn, Natasha," he said, and she heard the slight hesitation when he said her name. He wasn't sure where he stood with her which she knew was her fault.

She smiled and turned her head toward him just a little, not quite looking at him, and took her turn. Two more times around the circle and Pepper glanced at her watch. "His nanny should be here any minute," she said. "I really have to get ready for a meeting …"

"We can watch him for a bit," Clint volunteered, glancing at Natasha. "If you want. I can watch him by myself if you need to go."

Natasha looked at Pepper instead of Clint. "Go ahead. We'll be fine."

Pepper held her gaze for a minute, smiling gently. "Thank you so much." She stood and squeezed Natasha's shoulder. "I'll be back for dinner okay, Felix?"

He smiled up at her. "'Kay. Bye, Mommy."

She stroked his hair, shot one more grateful glance at Clint and Natasha and was gone.

Natasha tried to ignore the sudden awkwardness she felt. She had rarely been alone in the same room with Clint since the accident. In fact, she'd avoided it. "What do you want to do now, Felix?" she asked, grateful for the small distraction on her lap.

"Go onna walk," he announced, shutting down the game.

She glanced at Clint's leg. The cast had been off for a couple of weeks but he still wore a knee brace for his healing ACL and he could only use one crutch since his arm was still in a cast thanks to the complicated compound fracture. He didn't go very far very fast.

"I'm okay," he said, using the couch to get to his feet. "As long as we don't go too far."

She watched him turn and reach for his crutch balancing on his good leg and remembered dragging him through over twelve miles of jungle. Felix didn't allow her to hesitate long, leaping out of her lap and tugging on her hand.

"C'mon!" he begged. "We can go to my park!"

During the cleanup after the Battle of New York Tony had bought one of the most decimated city blocks and turned it into a park with a memorial wall for those who had been killed during the attack. It was only two blocks from The Tower and Felix called it his park because he assumed just about everything in the city belonged to him by virtue of his father.

Clint nodded. "I went down to the park with Steve once. I can walk there."

Moving past her surprise that Steve would take him there of all places, Natasha got to her feet. "Did Steve show you the tunnel?" she asked, resigned.

He nodded and Felix cheered and led the way toward the elevator, Natasha trusting JARVIS to tell Felix's nanny where they'd gone. They rode all the way down to the garage to access the tunnel. After the Battle of New York they had all become celebrities. Tony was used to it but the rest of them were very uncomfortable to be surrounded by paparazzi every time they tried to leave The Tower so they'd had a secret tunnel built leading from the garage to an unassuming subway exit the next street over. They had eventually become old news and weren't constantly swarmed by photographers but most of them still used the tunnel out of habit.

The came out of the tunnel and made their slow way up the staircase from the subway, getting a few curious glances from the lunch time crowd but no one approached them and Natasha was grateful. She kept a hold of Felix's hand and an eye on Clint feeling rather responsible for both of them.

"Cwint, 'member when we camed to the park an' you swinged me so high I flied out?"

Natasha had to hide her smile. Pepper had not been happy after that incident but Felix was fine besides a bump on his head and a few tears.

Clint hesitated. "You could tell me about it, buddy," he said, and she heard the regret in his voice.

They reached the top of the stairs and headed down the street, Felix looking up at Clint in confusion. "'Member? I popped out?"

Natasha saw the look on Clint's face. "It was his third birthday just a few months ago and we were all at the park. Felix had way too much sugar and he was running everywhere. Pepper was worried he was going to run out to the street so she convinced you to take him to the swings." She found herself smiling at the memory of Clint slinging a giggling Felix over his shoulder and feigning grumpiness as he took him to the swings. "Felix kept telling you to push him higher so you did, but he let go to wave to Tony and flew right out of the swing. Pepper was mad for days."

She saw Clint smile out of the corner of her eye but she also could tell he felt the loss of that memory keenly. She wasn't sure if it would make it worse or better, but she suddenly decided to help reconstruct the day for him.

"Felix," she said as they neared the park. "Tell Clint what he gave you for your birthday."

She helped Felix lay out the details of that sunny day in the park as they walked through it and she found herself growing more relaxed around her former partner. He seemed to be more at ease with her as well, her name coming more easily from his lips. She hadn't realized how much she'd missed that.

As she watched Clint push Felix again, this time not so high, she couldn't help but tell herself that Pepper was probably right. Isolation wasn't the best way to heal. Being with Clint outside The Tower was like a breath of fresh air.

They made their way to the memorial wall, and Felix held out his hands, whining that his feet hurt after all that walking. Natasha lifted him to her hip and he sighed sleepily.

"We better get home," she said, glancing at Clint. "Is your knee okay?"

Clint nodded but his eyes were on the memorial wall.

She thought of what Phil had told her. "You were a hero," she said softly, shifting Felix higher on her hip as he relaxed against her.

He let out a little laugh. "That's what Steve said too."

He kept his eyes on the memorial as she watched him. "You don't believe us."

He shook his head just a fraction.

"Well," she said with just a hint of a smile. "You didn't believe us then, either."

He was quiet for another long moment, his eyes tracking the names on the memorial. "You were there too?"

"Yeah. It was … I don't even know how to describe it." She remembered shoving that scepter into the machine, not knowing what would happen if she did but knowing it was the only option.

He turned to look at her. "You told me, just after I woke up, that we used to be partners."

She nodded, dreading the coming conversation.

"And you were there when… when I got hurt?"

She nodded again, looking down at Felix who had almost fallen asleep against her shoulder.

"I think …" he hesitated, and out of the corner of her eye she could see him shift uncomfortably. "I don't know what happened, but I think you did everything you could. Phil probably did too. So why do you feel so guilty?"

Her next breath caught in her throat and she found herself holding onto Felix a little more tightly. "I don't feel guilty."

"I know I lost everything in my past, but I'm not blind," he said, his tone surprisingly gentle.

_You always have been able to see more than you're supposed to_. "I didn't get you out soon enough," she told him, staring at the wall. "You were trapped for days and I wasn't smart enough or strong enough to get you out."

She held still, hoping for anger, hoping he would tell her how much he hated her for letting him stay in that jungle so long. It was what she deserved.

"Natasha," he said. "I don't know why, but I trust you. When I first woke up I was terrified. I didn't know what was going on or what had happened, but when I saw you I was sure that things were going to be okay. That's how I know that you did everything you could to get me out. It wasn't your fault and it wasn't Phil's."

She forced herself to look up at him, meeting his eyes for the first time in a long time. "I'm sorry anyway," she said.


	16. Chapter 15

It was his old bow, they told him. He used to take it with him wherever he went, Tony said. He used to practice down here on the range for hours and hours trying harder and harder shots and never missing, Bruce told him. It used to be a part of him.

He curled his hand around it, conscious of everyone's eyes on him. The cast on his arm had only been off for a few days but it seemed it was expected of him to try the bow. He wasn't sure what they were hoping for but he could see the hope in all their faces when he'd agreed to come down to the range. Maybe they thought firing the bow would miraculously return the person he used to be to them.

Phil handed him his quiver and he looked up to meet his eyes. "You don't have to do this, Clint."

Clint nodded and tried to smile. "One more piece of the puzzle," he said.

Phil stepped back, watching. Clint felt like they were always watching him, looking for some hint of who he used to be he was sure. They never said it, but he knew he wasn't who they were looking for. It was hard to imagine that he used to be somebody different but the most confusing part was, he didn't know if he wanted to be that person or not.

He slung the quiver over his shoulder and reached back to pull out an arrow, stringing it almost before he knew he'd done it. Bruce had told him that his memory loss shouldn't affect his muscle memory so all he had to do was not think about it too hard and let his body figure it out.

He shifted his stance, lining his shoulders and hips up with the target and raised the bow. He pulled back on the string, feeling a twinge in his previously dislocated shoulder. The fletching felt right against his cheek as he sighted down the arrow, focusing on the target. Then he released the string.

The arrow jumped from the bow, flying away from him and hitting the paper target with a crisp smack, right in the bulls eye. He stared at it, the bow dropping to his side in shock.

"Still got it," Tony said, and Clint recognized the familiar combination of hope and regret in his voice.

He reached for another arrow, not quite ready to look back at the rest of them yet. Their eyes on him were enough. He lifted the bow again and fired off three more arrows in such rapid succession that he barely noticed what his own body was doing but as he reached for the fourth arrow, the footage of himself he'd seen Phil watching came suddenly to him. He froze, realizing he'd used this bow to kill people. To cause destruction. He didn't even know how many people he'd killed with the thing in his hand.

It fell from his fingers with a clatter and the quiver followed, scattering arrows across the floor. Tony held out a hand to stop him as he pushed past the silent crowd and Bruce asked him if he was hurt, but the only thing he wanted was to be alone. Away from the watching eyes that knew exactly what he had done.

They let him go and once he was in the hall he ran. He didn't take the elevator even though his bad knee was threatening to give out on him, just ran up the stairs until he couldn't breathe and his leg buckled under him. He fell against the wall and held still, drawing air into his lungs, closing his eyes against the things from his past he'd seen.

"Clint?"

It was Natasha. Her voice was faint, a couple of landings away, but he was sure she could hear his labored breathing.

"Can I come up?"

There was something about the hesitancy in her voice that made his pounding heart slow just a fraction. "Yeah," he managed.

He kept his eyes closed as she came up the steps and sat next to him on the metal stairs. She didn't speak at first and he was grateful to be given the chance to start feeling more in control. He open his eyes to find her eyes on him, full of concern. He wanted to look away but something told him there was understanding there too.

"Bruce is worried about your shoulder," she said.

He didn't bother answering. He had a feeling they both knew that wasn't the problem.

She gave a little resigned sigh and the corner of her mouth lifted. "Did Phil tell you how we met?"

He shook his head something like fear or maybe just anticipation building in his stomach.

"It was in Bolivia. You were sent to kill me." She was still holding his gaze and he tried to hide his surprise. He was hearing her words but not fully understanding them, not believing they were about the two of them.

"You told me later that you'd had a bead on me three times in two days, three perfect opportunities to put a bullet through my head. But you didn't. You came to my safehouse one night, refused to fight me even after I kicked you in the head, and offered me a job." She paused, a hint of moisture pooling in her eyes. "You saved me, Clint. I don't know what that means to you now, but you have to know that the good you've done outweighs anything else."

He drew in another long breath, feeling his own tears gather. "I'm sorry you lost him."

"Who?"

"The man who saved you."

Her gaze dropped. "You don't have to be sorry for that. You're still the same."

"Because I can still hit the bullseye?"

Her lips hinted at a smile. "Because you care about the people around you, you're a good person. I don't think you've ever realized that, even when you had all your memories."

"I wish I could believe it."

She reached out and grabbed his hand, the hand that had fired arrows into countless victims. "Do you trust me or not?"

He thought for a moment, then curled his fingers around hers and nodded. "I trust you."

She stood, pulling him to his feet. "Then believe me when I tell you you're a good man," she said fiercely.

He nodded again, his throat too tight to speak, and followed her back down the stairs.

* * *

**Only 3 chapters left! Thanks so much for all your support! :D**


	17. Chapter 16

Clint stopped waking up confused the next day. For the first time in his memory, he came awake knowing exactly where he was and who he was without having to remind himself.

At first, when he'd still been confined to a hospital bed, he'd kept a notebook with his name on the first page and names of the other people in The Tower. It had been difficult to keep the information they gave him in his head for a while. It slipped out whenever he wasn't concentrating on it, and so he'd written things like "New York-Avengers Tower-home" in there, and Pepper had filled in his birthdate and place under his name. And after spending the afternoon with Natasha and Felix in the park he'd written down every detail they'd given him about Felix's birthday. For the past several weeks the first thing he did every morning was reach for the notebook and let it remind him who he was.

On that day he woke up knowing his name without thinking about it. He still lifted the notebook from his nightstand out of habit, but he didn't open it. He just held it, staring and remembering. The memories were coming so easily he thought he might be able to drift back to before the accident, and he let himself try, but couldn't get there. His first real memory was of Felix breathing peanut-butter scented breath into his face and the voices of Tony and Pepper.

He was only mildly disappointed, he hadn't really expected to rediscover his old memories anyway, and rolled out of bed, putting the notebook down. He gave it a triumphant look before heading to the shower, as if to let it know that he didn't need its help anymore.

He didn't need any help anymore. His knee still twinged if he moved it in a certain way, but he hardly noticed the discomfort now, and he only had two more physical therapy appointments for his shoulder before he could officially be declared fully healed. He would feel better if his mind would heal, but he was resigned to the idea that he would never get his past back. The glimpses he got of his past self from the people around him seemed like they belonged to someone else and now things seemed to be sticking, filling in all the empty places instead of just falling through the holes. Natasha had told him he had been a good man, and he was determined to be one again.

"I need a job," he announced during his breakfast ritual with Tony and Felix. The three of them were on a similar schedule since the others got up earlier, except for Bruce who usually stayed up with Tony in the lab then slept in.

Tony broke his staring match with his three-year-old, ignoring for the moment that Felix was refusing to eat his eggs because his father had made them, not Steve. "What kind of job?"

Clint shrugged, taking a bite of his fruit loops. "Anything, really. I don't know what I'm good at besides archery."

He caught the look that crossed Tony's face and hoped his friend wasn't going to bring up what had happened on the range the day before. "Uh, well, you're great at sarcasm. You're excellent at subtle but devastating practical jokes, which you never played on me of course."

Clint raised his eyebrow. "I bet I only played them on you. C'mon though, I must have some actual skills."

Tony shifted his attention back to Felix, pushing the kid's plate toward him. "Unfortunately, if I describe your particular skill set, a certain government agency will come and take both of us away."

Clint thought he didn't sound like he actually believed that but Clint didn't want to know about that stuff anyway.

"Tony, I feel like we must've known each other pretty well. You're telling me I had no hobbies?"

Felix shoved his plate back towards Tony, who heaved a long-suffering sigh. "Your job didn't leave much time for leisure. Felix, eat your eggs."

"I want 'Teve to make dem!" the little boy cried. "He does it yummier!"

Tony dropped his head to the table in a theatrical show of defeat, only to snap back up again. "You used to cook. You used to make these omelets that were just…"

Clint thought about it for a moment. "Cooking, huh? Did I have recipes that I could look at?"

Tony shook his head. "Nope. Tragically. If you did they're probably hidden somewhere we'll never find them."

Clint got up to clear his dishes. "Thanks, Tony. Hey Felix, if you finish your eggs maybe we can go to the park."

The little boy's eyes lit up and Tony gave Clint a little nod of gratitude as the little boy shoved a forkful in his mouth. "You can be official Tower chef and babysitter."

"Okay but I don't come cheap," Clint said.

* * *

That night Clint cooked dinner and everyone carved out time in their schedules to be there. It was the first official team night they'd had in months and the atmosphere was finally lightening. He'd made marinated steak from a recipe he'd found online and with Natasha's encouragement added his own seasonings. They sat around the giant table together and talked and laughed, beginning to take the fact that Clint couldn't remember past conversations and events in stride and retelling the "family" stories for his benefit.

"Cap was mad for _days_," Tony laughed.

Steve pointed his fork at him, trying to hide a smile. "It wasn't funny."

"You didn't really think Bruce turned himself into a hamster did you?" Natasha asked.

Steve feigned offense. "What was I supposed to think? Clint came running into the gym totally panicked talking about some kind of accident in the lab, and when I get there, Stark is cradling this little hamster, practically in tears."

"I looked up at him and I said," Tony picked up the story, choking on laughter. "Steve, we gotta help him! We gotta help Bruce!"

The table erupted in breathless laughter as Steve shrugged, looking slightly abashed. Pepper put a hand on his arm, wiping tears from her eyes. "You're right, Steve. It wasn't funny," she giggled.

"It was all your idea you know," Bruce added, looking at Clint with a rare grin.

Clint laughed, shaking his head. "I just wish I could remember the look on Steve's face."

The Captain groaned good-naturedly and Tony raised his eyebrows. "Just so happens, I had J take a picture."

But before he could ask Jarvis to show them, the universal "suit up" alarm went off. There was a threat somewhere that needed one or all of The Tower's residents, and from habit everyone leapt to their feet just as Phil came out of the elevator.

"Aliens in Rio. Feel like taking the jet out?" he asked by way of explanation.

"Cool. Hey Clint, wanna come?" Tony said, grabbing one last bite of steak.

Everyone paused on their way to the hangar to look at him. He'd been around before when an all call came through but no one had yet considered he'd be going with them.

His eyes met Natasha's and then Phil's and he saw something refreshing there. They weren't looking at him like they hoped either way, they were looking at him like they would accept whatever his choice was. They all were. They were looking at _him,_ not his memory loss, not the Clint he used to be.

He wanted to go, caught up in the moment, feeling like part of a team, but he remembered how it had felt to see himself killing those people. How he had seen it again when he picked up his bow.

"Stay safe," he said, smiling at Natasha. "I'll watch from here."

She smiled back and nodded, and they left, waving over their shoulders and disappearing into the elevator.

Pepper came to stand next to him as the doors slid shut. "Are you sure?"

He glanced at her. "Yeah, I'm sure."

She watched him for a moment. "You don't want to do it anymore do you?"

He thought for a moment, looking back at the elevator doors. "I'm not sure I ever did."

* * *

**Thank you so much for reading! :D Also, guess who finally gets to go see AoU this Thursday? This girl! :) This story will be complete by then if I can get the ending re-written satisfactorily.**


	18. Chapter 17

Tony jerked awake at the sound of Jarvis' voice, lifting his head from his work table and uncurling his fingers from the tool he'd been clutching. On the plane ride home from Rio after their victory over the "alien of the week," he had happily anticipated getting some of their tech into his lab, but it wasn't long before he succumbed to exhaustion.

"Sorry to wake you, Sir. You said to alert you immediately with any new research on amnesia."

Tony blinked and stumbled to his feet, sudden hope reanimating his sleep-heavy limbs. He and Bruce had combed through everything out there in the field of neuroscience and brain injuries in the weeks following Clint's memory loss until they were so discouraged by the dim outlook that Tony had put JARVIS solely on the task. It had been days since the last report of something new.

"What is it?" he said, his mouth dry.

Jarvis presented diagrams and charts to him one after another. "It appears a neurologist in Pennsylvania has had a breakthrough with victims of memory loss due to encephalitis specifically. His latest results have yielded promising results on a number of test subjects."

Tony stared at the diagrams, fully awake now. "Good work," he said softly. "Get Natasha and Bruce down here. Is Phil still here?"

"No, sir."

"Just Nat and Bruce then."

"It's 4:13 AM, sir."

"This can't wait," Tony said, a smile spreading across his face.

* * *

"You think it could really work?" Natasha said reserving her enthusiasm.

Tony nodded eagerly, bringing up more articles and reports with a flick of his fingers. "Nobody's been able to do what he's doing before. Others have tried electrical stimulation to try and jumpstart the damaged neural pathways, but he's doing it with precision instead of the cluster effect. Look at this," he said, walking around the room and taking her and Bruce on a tour through Doctor Duboisky's research.

Natasha glanced at Bruce. He was studying the information thoughtfully, his fingertips against his lips. He started to nod.

"Yes! You see this, Bruce?" Tony said.

"I think it's worth a shot. The risk seems minimal, and if it works we could be looking at 100% recovery."

Natasha's heart pounded. She couldn't allow herself to hope that it would work. She'd just barely started to accept that Clint would never be the same, started to appreciate him for who he was now, and it seemed impossible that the old Clint could return. But they had to try, didn't they?

"So who's going to tell him?" Tony asked eagerly.

Bruce shook his head. "We don't want to get anyone's hopes up before we've done more research."

Tony gaped at him. "What more do we need? This is it! It's going to work."

"What's going to work?" The three of them all turned to see Pepper standing in the lab entrance.

Tony went to her, grinning, and grabbed her hand. "Come see this. You have to see this. We're going to fix Clint!"

Natasha felt his words like a bucket of cold water over her. Fix him? He wasn't one of Tony's suits that needed a tune up, he wasn't … he wasn't even broken. He was different than he used to be, that was certain. He'd proved that when he'd decided not to rejoin the team. But he was a whole person. She'd seen that recently: at the park with Felix, the way he joked around with Tony, the way he laughed and his eyes genuinely lit up. Maybe he was now the least broken out of all of them.

"I'll talk to him," she said, cutting Tony off.

They looked at her and Pepper gave her a small smile.

"Make sure you tell him it's not a guarantee," Bruce said. "We don't even know if Dr Duboisky will be willing to perform the procedure."

Tony snorted. "I think that of all people we could persuade him."

Natasha returned Pepper's smile. "I'm going to tell Clint it's up to him," she said.

"Obviously, but he's not going to decide not to try it," Tony said.

Pepper bumped his shoulder. "Promise you'll support whatever he decides," she said firmly.

Tony rolled his eyes.

"Thank you," Natasha said, letting the sincerity she felt color her words. "Thank you for not giving up."

* * *

Natasha waited for Clint in the kitchen. She'd been there since leaving Tony's lab three hours ago, thinking about what she would tell Clint. A month ago she wouldn't have given him an option. A month ago she had missed the old Clint so fiercely that she would've done anything to get him back, but now she knew the person he was now. She still missed her partner and lover with a deep ache added onto all her other deep aches, but she couldn't deny that he was happier now than she'd ever known him to be. Could she encourage him to give that happiness away? Have all the memories that once weighed on his soul come flooding back to haunt him just so she could have him back?

She had spent nights awake wondering what it would be like if their situations were reversed. There were certainly things she'd happily forget, but if those are the things that made her who she was, was it fair to let those things go?

She heard the laughter before she saw them; Clint's low chuckle mingling with Felix's ecstatic giggle. They came around the corner, Felix hanging onto Clint's forearm as he lifted the little boy so his bare feet dangled.

"Higher!" Felix squealed.

Clint tried to oblige, laughing, and then he noticed her. He set Felix down gently and smiled at her. She realized she'd been watching them with a faint smile of her own, but Clint must've seen something in her face. He went still despite Felix's pleas of "again! again!" and watched her for a moment.

"Hey, Nat," he said.

"Hey," she replied, the familiar nickname catching her like a punch in the gut like always.

"Felix," he said gently, turning away from her. "How about you go have a poptart in the TV room?"

The little boy's eyes lit up. "Mom doesn't let me do that," he said almost reverently.

Clint dropped a hand onto his head, ruffling his hair. "I think it'll be okay this time," he said, glancing back at Natasha.

He got Felix his chocolate poptart and sent him off before pulling up a chair next to her.

"What's wrong?" he said, and she could hear the careful way he kept the question casual.

She didn't know when her face had become so readable to him. She shook her head. "Nothing's wrong."

The corner of his mouth lifted. "Ok."

She looked into his face for a moment, still trying to decide what to tell him. "Clint," she said softly. "Do you trust me?"

His smile grew. "You know I do."

She paused again before deciding she owed it to him to be honest. "You know some things about your past. You know that not all of them are ideal. There are some things even further back that … that shouldn't have happened to you." She thought of his parents, his brother. Loki. She took a breath. "Tony found a doctor that might be able to help you regain your memories."

He was still looking at her, but his smile had faded.

"It's up to you, Clint." On impulse she reached across the table to touch his hand. "Whatever you choose, you have a home here."

He was frowning now, looking down. "How can I choose? I don't know what past I'm choosing. No past or a bad one? What kind of choice is that?"

"It wasn't all bad," she said quietly.

He turned his hand over to grasp her's, palm to palm. "I trust you," he said. "You decide."

She sucked in a breath. "Clint, you can't … It has to be you."

He was already shaking his head. "You knew me then, you know me now. Please."

The intensity in his eyes held her gaze and she knew that even if she hadn't saved him soon enough from the compound, there was more than one way to save him.

"Don't do it," she whispered, feeling her eyes fill. "It's not worth it."

He nodded, his own emotions visibly too strong for words, and released her hand.

* * *

**Oh, the rewrites these last two chapters have gone through... I would very much love to hear your thoughts! I'm still not even sure what my own are. ;) **


	19. Epilogue

**You guys. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. That MOVIE. It was ... blindingly wonderful. I can't even process how amazing it was. I am definitely supposed to be sleeping right now but I can't stop THINKING about it. And certain things made me like the ending I'd written to this so much more than I used to. YOU GUYS. So many perfect things!  
**

**Anyway, as this is the last chapter I want to give credit to my best friend who came up with large chunks of this plot and encouraged me to post when I was too scared. AND I want to give credit to all of you for being so encouraging and awesome! THANK YOU SO MUCH! I am really going to miss this story.**

* * *

Pepper put a hand on Tony's knee, stilling his bouncing leg. "It's going to be fine," she assured him quietly, looking around the silent waiting room.

"I know," he replied, making a point to lean back and appear relaxed. "I just don't get why they wouldn't let me in there. Or at least Bruce. He's a doctor."

"Technically…" Bruce muttered wearily.

They'd had this conversation before. In fact, they'd all been having it with Tony all day, but Clint had asked only Natasha to observe the procedure and they were respecting his wishes. Pepper surmised that Clint didn't want them in there in case it didn't work. He couldn't stop them all from flying out to New Jersey with him however, but Pepper was beginning to think that hadn't been the best idea either. It would have been much easier to keep Tony occupied if he had his lab. Instead, Tony, Steve, Thor, Bruce, Phil, Pepper, and Felix had been wandering around downtown New Jersey attracting attention and stopping at every coffee shop they came to which hadn't helped anyone's anxiety levels.

"He didn't even let Phil in," Tony continued. "They've been in there for hours so who knows what's going on. Last time we let him out of our sight idiot medical professionals gave him brain damage."

Pepper squeezed his knee. "If you wake Felix up he's all yours," she threatened quietly, glancing down at the sleeping boy in her lap.

Tony spared him a glance as well, his expression softening for just a moment before he got up to pace. Again.

"They will send word soon," Thor spoke up, his large frame looking especially so in the small plastic chair he was sitting in.

Phil nodded. "Any time now." He wasn't sitting, just standing quietly with his arms folded but Pepper could read the tension in his face.

"Steve, give me the letter," Tony said, whirling to face the captain, his palm outstretched.

He shook his head calmly. "I promised her not to open it until Dr. Doboisky is finished."

"C'mon," Tony said, smiling like he didn't believe Steve. "You heard Agent over here. They're probably almost done."

Steve just leaned back in his chair. And that was why Natasha had given Steve the sealed envelope not Tony, Pepper thought. She had to admit she was curious too, though. Almost ten hours ago before heading into the neurology wing with Clint, Natasha had handed Steve the envelope and made him promise not to open it until the procedure was finished. Tony had, of course, been obsessed with it ever since.

"He's here," Phil said quietly.

They all looked up as Dr. Doboisky came down the long hall toward them. He was neither smiling nor frowning which Pepper thought was disconcerting. Shouldn't he give them some kind of clue about how it went? Everyone stood with the exception of Pepper, who didn't want to wake Felix before she had to, and waited for the doctor to speak.

"Everything went well," he said, and a collective sigh escaped the team. "Your friends are in Recovery if you want to see them."

He pointed them in the right direction and headed back the way he came, but none of the Avengers moved yet. In the lingering silence, Steve opened the envelope and pulled out a single sheet of paper.

* * *

_3 Years Later_

Natasha stood on her toes and stretched up, trying to get the end of the banner pinned to the wall. She really didn't want to have to drag a chair over because she almost had it. So … close … there! The brightly colored "H" of Happy Birthday hung successfully. Now for the other end.

"I could use some help," she called to the other room.

"Almost done with the balloons," her husband called back.

She smiled, shaking her head. "You mean the game is almost over?"

His silence gave him away and she finished putting the banner up herself, muttering about the insanity of soccer fans. Then she turned to survey the kitchen. The food was set out (mostly purchased, she didn't cook) and the decorations were in place. They only needed the guest of honor now.

She walked into the living room, noting that not many of the balloons had been blown up. Her husband hastily grabbed the bag of balloons and stuck one in his mouth, his brown eyes not leaving the screen.

"Game's tied," he said around the balloon.

She plopped next to him on the couch, her fingers coming up to tease the curly blond hair at the nape of his neck. "Haven't you already seen this game?"

He shot her a sheepish grin, the orange balloon still hanging from his mouth.

"They're going to be here soon, turn it off," she said smiling, shoving his shoulder playfully.

As if by prophecy, there was a rap on the door and it opened, the birthday boy poking his head in.

"Come on in, Clint!" Natasha told him, standing to hug her friend.

He was holding his six-month-old daughter, Ava, in one arm which made the hug a bit difficult, but she didn't mind. "Looks good, Nat," he said warmly, catching sight of the banner and the other decorations.

"I can't take all the credit," she said. "Lane blew up at least two balloons."

Lane came forward to shake his hand while Natasha welcomed his wife, Grace, in with a hug.

"Where's everybody else?" she asked.

Natasha rolled her eyes. "Chronically late. But they do have to fly in all the way from New York, so. I'm sure they'll be here soon."

A few other friends from the neighborhood stopped by as everyone dug into the food, sending their kids to play outside the house, and just when Natasha was starting to wonder if they should start cake and ice cream without the others, they arrived.

Tony was the first through the door, as usual, followed closely by Pepper and Felix, the latter of which dashed out the back door immediately before his mother could remind him to greet their friends. She apologized for the six-year-old, shaking her head, but Natasha waved it off, hugging her.

"I was getting worried you wouldn't make it," she said smiling. Steve and Bruce were next through the door followed by Phil, and even Thor and Jane had managed to get there. Natasha greeted them all warmly and waved them into the crowded kitchen. "We were just about to start the cake," she told them.

She brought the huge chocolate cake to the table and lit the candles, laughing at the good-natured jibes about how many there were, and someone flipped off the lights which prompted a very loud, slightly off-key rendition of the birthday song.

"...Happy birthday, dear Cli-iiiint! Happy birthday to you!" they finished.

Clint grinned at them all and leaned over the cake, blowing out all the candles in a single breath to cheers and applause. Natasha met his eyes over the cake as the lights flipped back on and shared a grin with him.

"And many more," she told him.

* * *

_Steve opened the envelope and pulled out a single sheet of paper..._

Clint asked me to make a choice, and I did.

You all know, more than anyone, that you can't escape the past. You can only learn to deal with it. And this is how I'm choosing to deal with it. Don't tell us anything about S.H.I.E.L.D. or what we've done in the past; allow us to live free of the things that haunt us.

Dr. Doboisky has agreed to remove my memories which will, I hope, provide further research in the field. In the future I believe he will be able to help many more people regain their pasts, but that's not the reason I'm doing this.

I've spent a long time trying to balance my ledger, and I never will. But Clint deserves a chance at real happiness, and I'm going to take it with him.

\- Natasha


End file.
